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Successful Implementation of OnEfficiency.Strength at DS Smith Witzenhausen for Quality Stabilisation

paperasia
  • Digital solution enables data-driven production control according to flexible target values and cost efficiency
  • DS Smith records significant improvements in paper strength consistency and process stabilisation
  • The solution will be available as part of Voith’s MillOne ecosystem, which connects all data in one production centre

With over 20 installations around the globe, OnEfficiency.Strength is setting new standards in data-driven papermaking. A recent installation at DS Smith Witzenhausen shows how the use of OnEfficiency.Strength can achieve impressive results in quality stabilization.

The digital solution’s key impacts include savings in raw materials such as fibres and starch, as well as reductions in paper machine energy use. Using real-time data from virtual sensors to predict strength, the system controls actuators such as the jet/wire ratio, refiner, starch application and different fibre types according to the highest cost efficiency to produce the relevant paper grade in the desired specification. 

As part of an optimisation project at the Witzenhausen site, where 430,000 tons of corrugated base paper with a basis weight between 115 and 210gsm are produced annually, the module initially achieved savings in raw materials on the PM1. 

In the further course, we defined a new focus on quality stabilisation and reduction of overprocessing. It was impressive to see how flexibly and quickly the system responded. Process changes that operators previously made empirically across multiple tambours are now performed quickly and effectively in a single tambour with OnEfficiency.Strength.

Daniel Goetze, Production Manager PM 1 at DS Smith in Witzenhausen

Thanks to the innovative OnEfficiency.Strength module, real-time control of paper quality is now possible. Using flexibly adjustable parameters, system goals such as raw material savings, strength reduction, quality stabilisation or a balanced compromise between these goals can be freely weighted. 

“The monitoring shows us that deviations from the mean value are decreasing. This means that fluctuations in strength have been significantly reduced and the paper machine is running even more stably,” explained Nils Schmidt, Production Supervisor at DS Smith Witzenhausen. “In addition, this value is now much closer to the specification, which has a direct impact on cost savings,” said Schmidt.

OnEfficiency.Strength is available as a standalone solution and will be part of Voith’s smart MillOne ecosystem. MillOne aggregates and analyses all data in one central production centre, providing an unprecedented level of integration and consistency in data usage to enhance human expertise and streamline production processes. Thanks to real-time data analytics, predictive maintenance and smarter decision-making, it can make mills more productive, reduce costs and increase profitability.

More information about OnEfficiency.Strength at: https://voith.com/corp-en/products-services/automation-digital-solutions/onefficiency.html

More information about MillOne at: https://voith.com/corp-en/industry-solutions/papermaking/autonomous-paper-mill/millone.html

About Voith Group
The Voith Group is a global technology company. With its broad portfolio of systems, products, services and digital applications, Voith sets standards in the markets of energy, paper, raw materials and transport. Founded in 1867, Voith today has around 22,000 employees, sales of EUR5.2 billion and locations in over 60 countries worldwide and thus is one of the larger family-owned companies in Europe.

The Group Division Voith Paper is part of the Voith Group. As the full-line supplier to the paper industry, it provides the largest range of technologies, services and products on the market, and offers paper manufacturers integrated solutions from a single source. The company’s continuous stream of innovations facilitates resource-conserving production and supports customers in significantly reducing their carbon footprint. With its comprehensive automation products and leading digitalisation solutions from the Papermaking 4.0 portfolio, Voith offers its customers state-of-the-art digital technologies to improve the availability and efficiency of their systems in all sections of the production process.