Paper Excellence Canada Announces Restart Date of Number 3 Paper Machine at Crofton Mill

The Crofton mill's number 3 machine was curtailed in the spring of 2020 after the impacts of an external malware attack, a forest fibre shortage, and the COVID-19 pandemic simultaneously impacted paper production as well as global paper demand.

Nov. 24, 2020 - Paper Excellence Canada today announced that it plans to restart the number 3 paper machine at its Catalyst Paper mill in Crofton, British Columbia in early January 2021. The restart reflects the strong performance being delivered by Catalyst's paper sales force and paper operations making both existing printing and writing grades with new food and packaging papers.

The machine was curtailed in the spring of 2020 after the impacts of an external malware attack, a forest fibre shortage, and the COVID-19 pandemic simultaneously impacted paper production as well as global paper demand.

Approximately 58 jobs will return with the startup of the paper machine at the Crofton facility bringing its total employee count to about 560. Crofton is one of Canada's largest pulp and paper mills responsible for injecting almost $3 million into BC's economy daily.

"We're very excited to return to full production at Crofton." said Patrick Corriveau, VP of Paper and Packaging at Paper Excellence. "We're one of only a few companies that's actually resuming paper production so it's a testament to the hard work of our salespeople and the quality of our products and papermakers."

Paper Excellence continues to work on production of the new food and packaging papers while remaining committed to its traditional printing and writing grade customers.

Paper Excellence's Catalyst Crofton mill manufactures both pulp and paper products. The mill uses 87% renewable energy and has reduced its carbon emissions by 71% since 1990.

About the Crofton Mill

Located on southern Vancouver Island near Duncan, Crofton is an integrated pulp and paper mill with two operating paper machines and two pulp machines. Major products include newsprint, directory paper and kraft pulp, which is used to manufacture printing, writing and specialty papers. The mill has the annual capacity to produce 334,000 tonnes of paper and 341,000 tonnes of NBSK pulp.

Paper Excellence, headquartered in British Columbia, is a diversified manufacturer of pulp and specialty, printing and writing, and packaging papers that operates 9 facilities in Canada producing over 3.0 million tonnes annually with a workforce of over 3,000. To learn more, visit: www.paperexcellence.com.