Making forest products requires vast amounts of energy. It goes without saying that producing energy is very costly.
Resolute Forest Products has worked to conserve energy at every stage of the process.
There are two main targets of energy savings in Resolute Forest Products planning. First is the energy saving to be gained by increasing the efficiency of our harvesting and manufacturing operations. Second is the energy saving to be gained from our environmental processes such as reusing and recycling wastes.
For example, we strive to use as much of our solid waste material as much as possible for fuel for our power boilers. As a part of our water treatment process we recover spent chemicals and reuse these in our kraft pulp manufacturing.
Energy conservation is not as visible as our other environmental initiatives. There are no regulations mandating us to conserve energy and there is little public pressure to conserve energy at the industrial level.
Even so, Resolute Forest Products sees great value in optimizing our use of energy. Each time we redesign a major piece of equipment we search for ways to efficiently use hidden sources of energy. This can include the use of computerized equipment to more efficiently utilize every bit of fibre from every tree we cut.