“The purpose of conventional waste incineration is to reduce the volume and get rid of the waste, but UPM’s power plant in Schwedt burns solid fuels to produce heat and clean energy,” says Erkki Nyberg, Director of Business Development for the UPM’s Engineered Materials Business Group. “These fuels include recycled paper de-inking residue, waste wood, as well as paper and plastic rejects from the paper recycling process. Now, as part of RafCycle, self-adhesive labelstock waste has been added to this list.”

Drescher Euro-Label – a label printer from Gorzów Wielkopolski, Poland, is a pioneer in supplying labelstock waste fuel to UPM Schwedt. Marta Stańczak, Marketing and Environmental Specialist at Drescher Euro-Label, points out the benefits of the RafCycle process and collaboration with the UPM paper mill: “Until recently the costs of waste re-utilization were increasing by 20–30% every year. After calculating the costs of waste disposal and transport to Schwedt, it turned out that we were able to reduce our expenses on waste disposal by 70%. And the difference will grow bigger every year, because waste management gets more and more expensive.”

There are benefits for many parties in the RafCycle waste-to-energy process. First is the environment: less landfilled waste. Second come label printers in Europe, who now have a sustainable and reliable way to dispose of their waste. Thirdly, UPM Schwedt is able to minimize the use or – in the perfect case – substitute the use of waste wood and fossil fuels. UPM Raflatac benefits as well, being able to offer customers not only a labelstock product, but the service to complete its lifecycle in the labelling value chain.