When you love what you do, that’s AMORE

ANDRITZ Novimpianti is renowned for designing, installing, and servicing air and energy systems for tissue, paper and board production. These systems are designed and engineered with experience, passion, and know-how in the heart of the European paper industry, in Lucca, Italy. The ANDRITZ Novimpianti team provides expertise and focuses on a customer-centered approach to bring added-value and to enable maximized return on investment in the least amount of time possible.

Because these people have the skill, experience and vision, not to mention passion, to push the boundaries of technological performance, they bring the element of what Italians call Amore. In relation to business, Amore encapsulates a deep desire to bring the best to every situation. ANDRITZ Novimpianti embraced the term when it discovered that "ANDRITZ = more" abbreviated conveniently to a word that perfectly summarizes its philosophy.

ANDRITZ Novimpianti's Managing Director Luca Linari, explains, “People perform at their best when they are happy and valued in their work. Our internal relationships are vitally important. We care about our people from a health and safety point of view – this is the top concern for everyone in the organization and is embedded in our culture. But there is a deeper level of human need, that of motivation and validation, which we also nurture and which we believe is at the core of our mutually beneficial customer relationships.”

So, how is this motivation built and nurtured?

SYNERGISTIC BENEFITS

ANDRITZ as a group has grown over the years both organically and through acquisition of leading providers of complementary technology. When ANDRITZ acquired Novimpianti in Lucca, Italy, in 2018 to form ANDRITZ Novimpianti, it was a perfect example of creating synergistic benefits for both parties. “We have benefited greatly from being part of the ONE ANDRITZ family,” says Linari.

“Combining our expertise in air and energy systems for paper machines with ANDRITZ’s vision, expertise, and access to a wider global market and resources, such as the PrimeLineTIAC Innovation and Application Center in Graz, Austria, has been very significant for us. This resulted in a full range of state-of-the-art and forward-thinking solutions for our customers. It goes further, however. The open-door policy and dialogue at all levels of management allows all employees to take suggestions, observations, and problems right to the top of the organization. This encourages a very positive attitude among all of us, values human uniqueness, and brings all employees actively on board in our business journey. We are also a multicultural, global organization offering equal opportunities to all employees. Respect, collaboration, and inclusion are some of our core values.

TRAINING AND TEAM BUILDING

A concrete example of the openness to employees’ ideas and opinions within the organization is the ANDRITZ global employee engagement program, a listening strategy program that fosters the improvement of the ANDRITZ working experience in a very collaborative manner. There is also the ANDRITZ Ventures Startup Contest that invites all ANDRITZ employees to submit ideas for new products, services, and business models for the various areas. Selected teams and idea champions receive executive support, time, and resources to further develop and test their ideas in the market. It is no coincidence that since becoming part of the ANDRITZ Group, ANDRITZ Novimpianti has filed numerous new patents. In this context, sound educational and training courses are a regular feature of life at ANDRITZ to maintain and increase employee job satisfaction and motivation, to develop new skills or enhance existing ones, and retain employees in the company with prospects of international career opportunities. Another important corporate goal is to increase the proportion of women in the workforce every year.

“This approach to human enhancement, inclusion, and internal relationships is fundamental to our customer-centered approach,” continues Linari. “Because an organization that is healthy and motivated is in the strongest possible position to provide exceptional customer service. In fact, we value and support our customers and our own team members with the same Amore. This has been observed by many customers when their teams have worked alongside ours during projects and beyond.

“Every business needs to perform financially to survive, expand, research, develop, and meet its obligations. But at ANDRITZ Novimpianti we believe that if we take a customer-centered approach, based on mutual respect and the aspiration of mutual benefit, then sustainable success will follow for all of us.”

SUSTAINABLE TECHNOLOGIES FOR THE FUTURE

At the heart of sustainable success must be a willingness to address the challenges of tomorrow, and not just those that immediately confront us. ANDRITZ’s CircleToZero™ global program reflects this commitment concretely with the goal of achieving zero emissions and zero waste at the same time as creating financial growth for customers. For pulp and paper producers, this means eliminating unused industry side streams, thus turning them into new value-added products.

But ANDRITZ’s vision for sustainable tissue, paper and board production goes beyond its carbon capture technologies and premium quality drying solutions, such as the PrimePress XT Evo shoe press and PrimeDry YES heat recovery steam generator system. In fact, ANDRITZ Novimpianti is deeply invested in reducing emissions at source through the use of alternative fuels such as, for example, Syngas technology at Sofidel Kisa tissue mill in Sweden. For the first time ANDRITZ Novimpianti's specially designed burners and upgraded hood have enabled use of renewable gas (bio-syngas) for the tissue drying process resulting in a reduction of CO2 by 8,500 tons per year as compared to the CO2 emissions generated by fossil fuel LPG. This is set to be a benchmark for sustainable practices in tissue mills to reduce, and ultimately eliminate CO2 emissions, reduce operation costs, and to improve fuel availability.

Another example where ANDRITZ Novimpianti is using technology to address the need for sustainable production is through electric heating with PrimeDry Hood E for tissue drying, which gives mills the opportunity to increase energy efficiency by up to 4% and reduce the carbon footprint up to 70% compared with gas-heated systems. The hybrid option is also feasible so that mills can select the fuel source according to fluctuating requirements and tariffs as well as climate conditions.

Where the tissue producer’s priority is self-sufficiency in electricity, ANDRITZ’s cogeneration system is a win-win solution for energy efficiency, the economy, and the environment offering tissue mills the option to use hot air from the turbine exhaust to heat the Yankee hood instead of the traditional hood burners, and generate steam for the Yankee, resulting in curbing CO2 emissions by up to 50% compared to separate heat and power systems.

ANDRITZ’s sustainability efforts go further and open the path to fully zero impact green hydrogen from renewable resources. The recent partnership with HydrogenPro, leader in green hydrogen technologies and systems, in particular, high-pressure alkaline electrolyzers, will allow ANDRITZ to provide complete green hydrogen plants. Green hydrogen can replace 100% of the fuel used to heat the Yankee hood with zero polluting emissions and without consuming precious natural resources.

With a focus on North America, where energy-intensive TAD technology is dominant, ANDRITZ is looking at processes to reduce moisture levels going into the dryers, which will save energy and thus reduce emissions and costs. The vision is carbon neutrality also in TAD drying.

“Sustainability is everyone’s challenge and provides the perfect scenario for a customer-centred approach as we create our roadmap to net zero,” says Linari. “Our technological solutions implemented in industrial applications help us to learn and grow together, because nobody can do this alone. We plan to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by the end of 2025. And when we stake our future and that of the environment on mutual cooperation, that’s Amore.”