Gerald Schweighofer, owner and CEO of Holzindustrie Schweighofer © Holzindustrie Schweighofer
Hopes are the approval process will be completed soon. This would allow the new facility to be started up in mid-2014 in single shift mode. Usually Schweighofer-sawmills run double shifts after only three months.
"We wanted the plant to be in the Hungarian speaking part of Romania as there are logistical synergies with the existing plants and the port of Constanza", owner and CEO Gerald Schweighofer explains. Since the new location will be built in the middle of a spruce region, Schweighofer will be focusing on this type of wood as raw material for the plant. He is also thinking about producing lumber of 5 m length.
Technically, the new plant will be based on the same concept as the other two sites in Sebes/RO and Radauti/RO – with a Linck profiling line and a Springer high-performance sorting as their backbone. Schweighofer is also employing components that originally Kronospan wanted to use in Romania. "The saw line and the one we operate in Radauti are exactly the same", says Schweighofer. The log yard will be designed by Holtec.
All these suppliers will also install the equipment and supervise the start-up process. As for the heating plant, the drying kilns and the further processing, Holzindustrie Schweighofer has not yet decided on suppliers.
The annual input target is at 800.000 solid m³. In total, the company's log consumption would come to approximately 3.5 to 3.6 million solid m³/year. As in Sebes and Raudauti, much of the lumber produced will also be processed on site: In Covasna, this share will be 70%. In the new mill a post line will be operated with a capacity of 100,000 m3/year, which will step up the company's total post capacity output by 50%. No orders have been placed with suppliers yet.
At the site in Radauti, half of the posts with an annual capacity of 100,000 m3 will be produced in pine. Schweighofer's panel producing plants in Siret/RO and Comanesti/RO will expand their capacities – with the new sawmill being one of the major suppliers of raw material. The investment in Siret will come to € 5.6m, that in Comanesti to between € 15m and € 20m – all of these amounts are not included in the € 150m-investment in Covasna.
A large part of the sawings and shavings will be converted into pellets (100,000 t/y). The wood chips will be delivered to various customers in Romania (for example Kronospan or Kastamonu) and in Austria. To meet energy demands of the new plant, Covasna will also see another biomass cogeneration plant installed – with a capacity of 10 MWelec and 30 MWtherm.
With the two existing sawmills and processing operations, Holzindustrie Schweighofer has landed some of the most successful investments ever made in East Europe. "But we have learned things the hard way. Without the knowledge of ten years as a producer in Romania I would hardly dare to embark on such a project here", Schweighofer says today. "60% of the € 150m-investment will be financed with equity – which shows that we have not been entirely unsuccessful recently."
With two sawmills already in operation, experienced staff are ready to take on start-up and running the new plant in Covasna. With the new operation, the number of employees in Schweighofer Romania will increase to 3000.
The plans for an investment in the Ukraine are still alive: The industrial property in the Ukraine has already been purchased, measures of infrastructural improvement are also planned for 2013.
Facts & Figures Holzindustrie Schweighofer (as of 2013)
Headquarters: Vienna/ATStaff: 2600 Turnover: € 750m (including real estate)
Log consumption: 2.7m solid m3/year
Kiln drying: 1.57m m3/year Pellets, briquettes: 260,400 t/year
Glue-laminated panels: 65,000 m3/year
Lumber-core panels: 95,000 m3/year (including middle layers or shuttering panels)
Green Power Capacity: 35 MW
Viscose pulp: 140,000 t/year
