Stora Enso has confirmed the permanent closure of its Tiukka corrugated packaging plant in Kristiinankaupunki, Finland (~50 staff, change negotiations since Sept. 22); Finnish corrugated production will be centralised at Lahti, with the last employees expected to leave during 2027 (Papnews, EUWID)
The USITC made affirmative preliminary injury determinations on corrugated die-cut boxes from China, Malaysia and Turkey (with subsidy allegations for Turkey), so Commerce's AD/CVD investigations continue; the Commission's public report is due by Dec. 18 (Papnews)
Romanian entrepreneur Vladimir Cohn's €80–90M kraft paper mill at Giurgiu is about 60% built and targeted for 2028 — 120,000–130,000 t/yr of recovered-fibre bag kraft, 150–200 jobs, roughly 60% for export (Papnews)
Update: Nippon Dynawave will appeal the $77,800 L&I fine over the March hot-pulp sinkhole at Longview; managers told inspectors such spills happened about every couple of months, and L&I has widened its inquiry to chemical use and storage at 10 Washington pulp mills (KUOW)
Forestry & Timber
Canada-US trade talks are back on after a Carney–Trump call on Saturday, about 10 weeks after August's collapse, with the Section 232 tariffs (10% on lumber, on top of 24.75% combined AD/CVD) central; formal negotiations could resume later this week, and the August draft would have removed the lumber tariff (Wood Central)
UPM registered the plywood demerger on Oct. 31 and WISA Group (ticker WISA) was set to begin trading on Nasdaq Helsinki on Nov. 2, with UPM shareholders receiving one WISA share per UPM share (Fordaq)
Binderholz closed its acquisition of Finland's Kuhmo Oy on Oct. 30 — Kuhmo processes 1M+ m³ of roundwood a year with ~180 staff and ~€150M revenue, taking the group's Kuhmo/Lieksa/Nurmes intake to ~2M m³/yr; price undisclosed (Fordaq)
Goldman Sachs forecasts US single-family starts falling to 870,000 in 2027 from ~900,000 this year (September pace 859,000) as 7.3% mortgage rates weigh on affordability, with relief expected only in H2 2027 as rates ease toward 6.4% (Wood Central)
Segezha Group named Yevgeny Onatsky president effective Oct. 30, replacing Kirill Arsentyev (in charge since June 2025), with a mandate for sustainable positive operating cash flow and gradual debt reduction (Fordaq)
Norway's Viken Skog has lifted pulpwood purchase prices by NOK 50/m³ over the autumn and standard spruce sawlogs by NOK 30/m³ from Nov. 1, citing low customer stocks ahead of winter and strong spruce demand (Fordaq)
Australia's $300M Forestry Growth Fund opens a $14M+ plantation grant round on Nov. 5, with up to $30M in innovation grants due in December and $85M in processing-modernisation grants in May 2027 (Wood Central)
Wood Pellets & Biomass
Drax, Brookfield and its Radiant platform unveiled a £20B partnership for up to 1 GW of AI data-centre capacity at the Selby biomass station — Phase 1 of 100 MW (up to £2.5B) from Q1 2028 and 500 MW by 2031 — using the pellet-fired plant's surplus capacity, subject to planning and a tenant; Drax shares rose 8.5% (City AM, Construction Briefing)
Northwest Advanced Bio-Fuels signed Black Gold Equity Partners as funding partner for its $3B woody-biomass SAF biorefinery at Longview, Wash., fed by forest slash and sawmill residuals; groundbreaking is targeted for late 2027 with a three-year build (Wood Bioenergy)
CHAR Tech's Thorold, Ont. facility received final ESA electrical approval, letting its pyrolysis kiln reach operating temperature; only TSSA sign-off remains before Phase 1 produces up to 5,500 t/yr of wood-waste biocarbon for ArcelorMittal Dofasco (Canadian Biomass)
Industry Technology Vendors
Andritz — Its LoSolids continuous cooking plant replacing the batch digesters at MM Kwidzyn (Poland) is now in operation, switchable between softwood and hardwood; the mill expects ~50,000 m³/yr less wood use and, with energy-efficiency measures, ~100,000 t/yr lower CO₂ — about a third of the integrated mill's emissions (PULPAPERnews, Papnews)
