AFRY selected as Metsä Fibre’s partner in the world’s most modern sawmill and new bioproduct mill projects in Finland to meet the highest safety, digitalisation and sustainability ambitions

Metsä Fibre and AFRY started the pre-engineering of Metsä Fibre’s investments, totalling approximately EUR 2 billion, in the spring of 2019.

Rauma to be the biggest sawmill investment ever in Finland  

Metsä Fibre has made the decision to build the world’s most modern sawmill in Rauma. The value of the investment is approximately EUR 200 million, and the new unit will produce around 750,000 cubic metres of pine sawn timber a year. Construction will begin in the spring of 2020. Production at the sawmill is set to begin during the third quarter of 2022. The coronavirus outbreak may have an impact on the schedules.

Metsä Fibre has awarded AFRY the construction phase engineering assignment including detail engineering of all disciplines. The contract is a continuation of the pre-engineering phase in which AFRY has been involved since spring 2019. The new sawmill will be a worldwide forerunner both in technology and in efficiency. For example, using machine vision and artificial intelligence in different stages of the sawing process is a significant new development. Similar technology is not yet in use anywhere else in the sawmill industry.

Letter of intent signed for Kemi bioproduct mill construction phase

Metsä Fibre’s planned Kemi bioproduct mill would produce 1.5 million tonnes of softwood and hardwood pulp a year as well as numerous other bioproducts. The starting point for the planning of the new bioproduct mill has been a high level of environmental, energy and materials efficiency. The mill would not use any fossil fuels at all, and its electricity self-sufficiency rate would be 250 per cent.

Metsä Fibre has signed a letter of intent with AFRY regarding project management and engineering services during the possible construction phase of the Kemi bioproduct mill. AFRYs assignment in the pre-engineering of the Kemi bioproduct mill continues, and Metsä Group expects to be ready to make a decision on this approximately EUR 1.5 billion mill investment in the autumn of 2020.

AFRY’s assignment includes Project Management services for the whole mill and all engineering disciplines for Balance of Plant (BOP). In addition AFRY will coordinate the overall digitalisation of the mill with BIM (Building Information Modeling) and PIM (Process Information Modeling) of the project including the establishment of SSOT (Single-Source-of-Truth) concept towards a digital twin, enabling the use of efficient digital applications to boost mill performance. The contract is conditional upon investment decision, and AFRY continues pre-engineering until the final investment decision.

Long-term co-operation and strong partnership

Metsä Fibre and AFRY have a long history in several successful projects.

“We have a long history of collaboration with AFRY in our strategic projects. When selecting partners, we value safety, quality and reliability, and AFRY has proven to meet all these criteria. Now we have a common target to build the next-generation sawmill, which is a significant leap forwards for the whole sawmill industry. Additionally, we also have the common target to build the pre-requisites for the investment decision on Kemi bioproduct mill in the autumn,” says Ismo Nousiainen, CEO of Metsä Fibre.

“We are proud to be Metsä Fibre’s partner in these strategically important, sustainable investments, targeting totally fossil free operations and high degree of self-sufficiency in electricity with high efficiency. Together we will also ensure that the high digitalisation level is achieved in all operations, enabling the digital twin and combining ET-OT-IT (Engineering technology data – Operational technology data – Information technology data), which is the basis for boosting the mill’s performance even further,“ says Nicholas Oksanen, Executive Vice President, Head of Division Process Industries of AFRY.

For more information, please contact:

Nicholas Oksanen, Executive Vice President, Head of Division Process Industries
Tel. +358 10 33 22294
e-mail: nicholas.oksanen@afry.com

Kalle Rasinmäki, President AFRY Process Industries Finland and Asia
Tel. +358 40 566 4250
e-mail kalle.rasinmaki@afry.com

About AFRY

AFRY is an international engineering, design and advisory company. We support our clients to progress in sustainability and digitalisation.
We are 17,000 devoted experts within the fields of infrastructure, industry and energy, operating across the world to create sustainable solutions for future generations. Making Future

About Metsä Fibre

Metsä Fibre is a leading producer of bioproducts, biochemicals and bioenergy. Metsä Fibre is the world's leading producer of bleashed softwood pulp and a major producer of sawn timber. Currently employing approximately 1,300 people, the company's sales in 2019 totalled EUR 2.2 billion. Metsä Fibre is part of Metsä Group.