Infra Leuna

Wastewater plant removes last bottleneck for UPM's Leuna biorefinery

Site operator Infra Leuna has commissioned a new anaerobic wastewater treatment plant built for UPM's wood-based biochemicals biorefinery at the Leuna chemical park in Germany, at a cost of EUR 41.7m including a linked biogas unit. The plant will pre-treat up to 130 cubic metres of heavily loaded water per hour once UPM reaches planned full output of about 220,000 tonnes of biochemicals a year, with throughput ramped up as UPM's own production rises.

Why this mattersThe facility removes the last major infrastructure bottleneck for UPM's biochemicals plant to reach full capacity at Leuna.

• Infra Leuna invested EUR 35.7m in the anaerobic treatment plant plus EUR 6m in a linked biogas unit, EUR 41.7m total
• At full output the plant will pre-treat 130 cubic metres of UPM wastewater per hour
• UPM's planned full production is about 220,000 tonnes of biochemicals a year at Leuna
• The anaerobic process removes 80 percent of organic load and generates biogas for up to 6 MW of continuous output
• UPM has invested EUR 1.3bn in total at the Leuna site

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