Lawter, a subsidiary of Harima Chemicals Group, Inc., and SunPine AB completed the agreement, announced on Nov. 7, 2012, to build a tall oil rosin production facility in Piteå, Sweden. With the closure of the agreement, Lawter has now become a shareholder in SunPine.
A team of SunPine and Lawter engineers jointly worked the past year and a half with a specialized engineering firm to model and test the optimal configuration for the integrated bio-refinery. A series of pilot testing has verified the modeled concept. Therefore, final project planning, will commence immediately.
It is expected that the new bio-refinery will be operational in the second half of 2015. At that time, SunPine will be producing three different products: Raw tall diesel. a raw material used in the production of renewable diesel; rosin. a raw material used in the production of derivatives, including printing ink and adhesives; and tall oil pitch, an energy product used in the paper industry.