Karioi upgrade on track

Ruapehu Bulletin, 25 August 1992, Page 9

Karioi upgrade on track

Karioi pulp mill's $20 million quality upgrade project is proceeding, despite rumours to the contrary. Winstone Pulp International general manager Dave Anderson said plans for the upgrade were proceeding, and that the engineer in charge of the project had been appointed. He is Roy Edwards who has worked on other development projects at the mill. Mr Anderson said it

was not true that the upgrade had been scrapped because of a shortage of wood resource, brought about by the Government selling off the country's timber resources. He said the company had earlier investigated an expansion process to increase the mill's capacity by 50,000 tonnes of pulp. This expansion had been put on hold because of the current depressed market for pulp, said Mr Anderson, not because of

a lack of wood resource. "Since that study the board decided to look at upgrading the mill to improve the quality of the pulp produced," he said. The board is to reconsider the expansion project some time towards the end of next year, taking into consideration the market and the effects of the quality upgrade on the mill's saies. Mr Anderson said at this stage they don't anticipate any problem with finding enough wood resource to feed the expanded mill.