WESTVACO PLANS NEW $80 MILLION CARBOND PLANT AT WICKLIFFE

WICKLIFFE, Ky. -- Westvaco, a major manufacturer of paper, packaging and specialty chemicals, will invest another $80 million in its Wickliffe, Ky, complex.

Westvaco officials announced recently that construction will get under way early next year on a facility to make activated carbon.

The new plant will provide up to 600 jobs during construction and will employ 60 persons when it opens in mid-1997.

Dr. William D. Major, a Westvaco senior vice president and manager of the company's chemical division, was in Wickliffe recently to announced plans for the plant, which will double Westvaco's capacity for manufacturing wood-based activated carbon.

"Products from the Wickliffe plant will be sold to customers around the globe for use in automotive emission control and other applications," said Major.

"We are excited about the potential for the chemical division as a new partner in this community," said Majors. "We look forward to further enriching the fine traditions built here by Westvaco's timberlands and fine papers decisions."

Westvaco, which started its paper-making operations at Wickliffe in a $90 million plant in 1970, has invested more than $200 million here over the past seven years, including $125 million to install new facilities to enable the mill to produce high quality coated paper. Also added to the Wickliffe plant was a $32 million wood yard.

The carbon plant will be built near the paper mill and will use hardwood sawdust as its basic raw material.

Sawdust, a waste by-product of the forest products industry, is usually burned or put into a solid-waste landfill, said Major.

"The new Wickliffe carbon plant will constructively use material from sawmills and other sources throughout the region," said Major.

The use of activated carbon results in better air quality. When installed in canisters and used in automobile emission systems, the carbon absorbs gasoline vapors before they reach the atmosphere. Westvaco markets activated carbon under the name Nuchar, which is manufactured in a plant at Covington, Va. The Wickliffe plant will more than double Nuchar production.

Major said the Wickliffe plant, like the Covington plant, will use a high-technology recycling process to convert hardwood sawdust into activated carbon. In addition to automotive emission control, applications for activated carbon include gas and vapor adoption, solvent recovery, sugar and syrup processing, pharmaceutical processing and water purification.

Westvaco already has a contract to supply activated carbon from Wickliffe for 1998 model cars.