Moroccan Sipat Tissue Chooses ABB Quality Control System for Optimising Operations

Sipat S.A. has selected a package of ABB technologies to help meet growth targets, including a substantial increase in production capacity. The full scope of supply includes the provision of High-Performance Infrared Fiber Weight sensors to enable energy and raw material cost savings. The commissioning signals a new era of production for lower energy usage, increased quality, and reduced costs.

ABB’s Quality Control System (QCS) for pulp and paper has now been integrated into Societé Industrielle Des Papiers Tissues’ (Sipat S.A.) premium tissue mill in Morocco. The package of technologies will enhance plant performance, increase efficiency, and ensure long-term reliability on two modern machines.

Owned and operated by generations of the El Kendouci family, Sipat S.A. is known for high-quality facial tissues and produces toilet paper, napkins, and kitchen towels. The mill in the city of Meknes supplies mainly to the Moroccan market.

ABB has now started up QCS800xA for tissue machines 1 and 2 (TM1 and TM2) including the High-Performance Infrared Fiber Weight (HPIR-FW) sensor that monitors both moisture and weight of the tissues powered with machine direction (MD) controls. Sipat S.A. can expect to see specific benefits of the system including non-hazardous optical measurement, reduction in moisture and fiber variation, as well as reduced energy usage and reduced fiber usage.

“ABB is a market leader in providing quality control solutions to the pulp and paper industry with a thorough understanding of the technical aspects of a paper mill while ensuring higher performance and productivity,” said Driss El Kendouci, General Manager, Sipat S.A. “This was key to our decision-making process. The legacy system had reached its end of life, and we chose to move to ABB not only for its technical merits but also its strong partnership, global experience, and local presence.”

“With our decades of experience in the pulp and paper industry, this project allowed us to leverage our expertise in the tissue-making industry,” said Ahmed Fathy, Pulp and Paper Local Business Line Manager, Egypt. “We already had a strong presence in the region, and our prior experience with QCS in mills in the region enabled us to win customer confidence. Sipat S.A. will continue to receive support from the local ABB team members, who played a key role in negotiations and the creation of the solutions package. With this project, we are excited to further expand our footprint across the tissue-making industry.”

ABB Ability™ Quality Management System (QMS) for pulp and paper ensures optimum quality throughout the entire manufacturing process to ensure on-spec paper at the lowest cost. It provides customers with full visibility over process and system performance with integrated online measurement, process and quality controls, and defect detection and correction. Using the most advanced full sheet, real-time detection and analysis technology enables consistent and repeatable results, and quality issues can be identified and corrected more quickly. QMS increases efficiency and product output by reducing sheet breaks and optimizing runnability.

The ABB HPIR-FW solution includes a proven design that delivers safe and reliable performance to directly measure fiber weight, moisture, and temperature in a single sensor without radiological isotopes and the regulations associated with them. With these highly precise measurements, operators can more confidently use controls for reduced variability, faster start-ups, and grade changes while also shifting targets closer to acceptable quality limits. This significantly reduces raw material costs and ensures energy savings.

ABB’s MD controls ensure minimum variability in paper properties while minimizing fiber and energy consumption using a model-based control approach. MD controls allow for the best steady-state disturbance rejection during cruise operation and significantly reduce off-spec time during start-up and sheet break recovery through fast-tracking response.

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