Palsgaard A/S, a Danish producer of food emulsifiers and plant-based polymer additives, has installed a new 10,000-tonne pellet line at its facility in Juelsminde. The new line was essential in order to meet rising demand for the company’s food-grade plant-based surfactants and modifiers for polymer manufacturers and compounders.
“We are seeing a fast-growing demand among consumers, brand owners, packaging designers and plastics manufacturers for more natural materials to reduce fossil depletion and waste,” says Ulrik Aunskjær, Global Industry Director Non-Food Business Development, Polymer Additives for Palsgaard.
Palsgaard produces a range of plant-based emulsifiers and polymer additives for the global food, packaging, and plastics industries. Its Einar brand of plant-based polymer additives, named after the company’s founder, Einar Viggo Schou, are rapidly emerging as highly effective and sustainable alternatives to conventional fossil-based additives.
The pelletised products produced by the new line will also addresses the needs of compounders and processors wishing to use specific Einar products directly in their polymer formulations rather than as part of a more complex masterbatch formulation. This applies in particular to the company’s Einar anti-static additives for food and other packaging applications, where additives in pellet form enable a clean and straightforward process.
The Einar product portfolio also includes slip additives, ageing modifiers, mould release agents, and dispersing aids, all of which are fully FDA and EU approved for food-contact applications.
Palsgaard is investing in an advanced spray cooling tower that will raise the company’s spray capacity by at least 30,000 tonnes. The tower is scheduled for commissioning in early 2023 and will be supported by multiple new reaction, distillation, and esterification plants – all set to double the production capacity at the manufacturer’s Danish facility in Juelsminde by 2024.
Palsgaard says the total investment in the capacity expansion, which will not affect Palsgaard’s carbon-neutral status, will be around 750 million Danish Kroner (€100 million).
“We have a number of new initiatives, including establishing a solar park and a biogas facility, which will provide the necessary power and waste management infrastructure to enable the new production capacity to also be carbon neutral. This aspect was a very important consideration in the planning process for the new investment,” said Aunskjær
Palsgaard, headquartered in Juelsminde, Denmark, is owned by the Schou Foundation and has 588 employees across 17 countries. Each of the six production sites, located in Denmark, the Netherlands, Mexico, Brazil, China, and Malaysia, are carbon-neutral. In 2020, Palsgaard achieved a turnover of USD 218 million (DKK 1.5 billion) with products sold to customers worldwide in more than 120 countries.