Unilin is to invest more than €100m in upgrading its particleboard factory in Oostrozebeke, Belgium.
The facility produces about 575,000cum of board a year for the flooring, kitchen and furniture sectors.
The company says the investment, one of its largest in recent years, will allow it to maintain capacity while being more efficient in raw material use and using about 8% less energy.
The plant produces particleboard using 100% recycled waste wood – more than 90% of which is post-consumer – and Unilin intends to further develop the site into a leading example of circular, low-carbon panel production in Europe.
At the heart of the project is the planned installation of a new continuous particleboard press, replacing two existing presses, combined with a broader renewal of key production processes across the site. Work will begin in the third quarter of this year and will take until 2029.
‘This investment is about preparing our Oostrozebeke production plant for the next decades. By combining state-of-the-art technology with 100% recycled wood as raw material and a clear product focus across our different sites, we aim to confirm our reliability as a supplier and set our customers up for success in the years to come. With this investment, we build a solid foundation for further innovation, and at the same time, we are creating an even safer and more efficient working environment for our people,’ says Bert Vandenkendelaere, Unilin Panels president.
The project will receive up to €6m of support from the Flemish Government: half for strategic transformation support for training and the other half for ‘strategic ecology support’. The site employs 370 people.
