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STARBUCK–Columbia Pulp LLC has resumed operation of its first-of-its-kind mill located in here
Idled between April, 2020 and June, 2021 due to the pandemic, the company used that time to implement numerous process improvements and has resumed production. Columbia Pulp is now steadily increasing wet lap production and improving quality for delivery to customers. In addition to a compelling sustainability story, the company has created over one hundred family-wage jobs while providing a revenue boost for local farmers and businesses.
Columbia Gold® fiber has a carbon footprint approximately half that of conventional pulp. The pulp mill converts residual wheat straw into several valuable products with the most prominent being Columbia Gold® fiber for papermaking and molding applications. Diverting the residual straw into the manufacture of an alternative pulp fiber mitigates the annual burning of over 100,000 acres. The mill site is environmentally friendly, generating neither solid waste that would go to landfill nor liquid effluent to a river.
The legislatures in both Washington and Oregon have recently recognized the important environmental attributes of alternative-fiber and modified plastic single-use bag ban laws that make wheat straw fiber legally equivalent to other environmentally-friendly alternative materials. California and Hawaii are said to be considering similar changes. Columbia Pulp is also pursuing Salmon-Safe® certification for its facility and is aligning with well-regarded ancient and endangered Forest protection organization Canopy (www.canopyplanet.org) to enable partnerships with consumer product groups and manufacturers.
The pulp mill production is being ramped up at five to ten percent per week with an emphasis on continuous quality improvement in deliveries of Columbia Gold® to several customers. Columbia Gold® offers several unique attributes. It can be considered interchangeable with conventional hardwood fibers, is fully recyclable, is clean and consistent, is FDA compliant, and has a beautiful golden shade well-suited for numerous applications.
To learn more about Columbia Pulp or to contact us, please visit https://columbiapulp.com/contact-us/.