company profile
kemind
COMPREHENSIVE COMPANY PROFILE
Founded on 1985, KEMIND is a producer and pre-eminent supplier of engineered treatment programs for industrial process systems and chemical auxiliaries for paper mills. Many aspects of the global marketplace in which the Company does the business have changed dramatically in recent years. Competition is fierce and customer demands have never been greater.
KEMIND, however, is aggressively responding to these challenges by reshaping its own organization to provide greater value to customers, create a competitive advantage, and achieve profitable growth.
Because of the growing interest on improvements in chemical water and process treatment program management in manufacturing operations and because customers are more accepting of new and different ways to meet their goals, KEMIND, today is expanding its level of involvement in a global industry-focused water and process treatment company, being widely skilled in engineered programs and advanced specialty chemical treatment applications for water, wastewater and process systems operating in the widest variety of industrial, commercial and institutional applications.
Our experience in the field of Papermill and Industrial water and process treatment allowed the Company to establish itself in the marketplace as much more than a supplier or vendor.
By developing strong and long-lasting relationships with its customer built on trust and centered on continuous improvement, KEMIND with its new organization is successful in proposing itself to customers as a valid and helpful partner providing to its customer's unmatched value through integrated products/service/technical support programs as follow:
- Developing intimate knowledge of customer needs, systems, and processes.
- Offering a unique range of customized products/service/technical support to achieve operational results.
- Recommending innovative solutions to meet specific goals and improve customer profitability and system reliability.
- Working in partnership with customers to implement cost-effective solutions
MISSION
The management of chemical treatment programs in Pulp & Paper mill and Industrial water and process is a core competency of KEMIND, and its Mission is briefly summarized through the following principles:
- To be recognized by its customers as a preferred supplier of water and process treatment programs and valued servicing.
- To continuously strive to offer the highest quality people, products, and services in order to meet the total needs of its customers.
- To provide its customers with superior technology and support helping them to reduce their operating costs and meet their environmental objectives.
- To offer technical support, servicing, water, and process treatment programs through one organization to make it easy for the customers meeting their needs.
ORGANIZATION & CUSTOMER FOCUS
Staying close to its customer, quickly responding to their needs, KEMIND recognized that having the appropriate technology and the right technical experts in the team is essential, therefore the Company decided to build up a knowledgeable and suitable organization with extensive experience in helping customers to achieve the targeted needs through :
Expansive technology portfolio: Its long experience on advanced specialty chemical treatments for water, wastewater, and process systems operating in the widest variety of industrial, commercial, and institutional applications and through its long term experience working side by side with customers, today give KEMIND the capability to provide added value to its customer by maximizing plant efficiency and productivity, paper machine runnability, paper quality, and saving water and energy, solving complex environmental problems.
Large knowledgeable field force: To satisfy the widest range of customer needs, KEMIND decided to build up its own very versatile and multi-purpose organization including in its team experts able to solve a wide range of specific technical and chemical problems in the field of water and process treatments and Pulp & Paper process.
KEMIND’s field forces are specifically trained in applying innovative solutions, and continuously monitoring the performance to ensure the best results.
Comprehensive customer service: KEMIND is committed to providing a complete customer service package. The service includes goods delivery programs, diagnostic tools, chemical feeding, monitoring and control systems, analytical services, optimization studies for operating cost reduction and/or customer profitability improvement.
TREATMENT PROGRAMS & APPLICATIONS
The portfolio of KEMIND includes a comprehensive range of solutions in terms of product lines and application services for water and industrial process systems. With its wide range of products and technologies, KEMIND is able to meet a wide range of different customer requests, adapting per each type of problem the right solution.
The performance of all Public and Industrial water operations is tied to the quality of influent water. The poor quality of inlet water can result in deposition and fouling, reducing the efficiency of the following utilities, increasing energy consumption and shut down of equipment
for cleaning.
Clarification programs are available to improve the quality of influent water by the use of specific products designed to remove organic colour, calcium and magnesium hardness, iron, suspended solids and many other undesired contaminants.
The treatment programs include designed polymer formulations for specific applications and available as liquid, emulsion or powder.
Due to the increasingly restrictive environmental regulations, the control of wastewater unit performance has a prominent role in both Industrial and Public sectors. To make effluent water quality acceptable for reuse or discharge requires more advanced technologies.
KEMIND provides polymer programs designed to improve effluent clarity in primary clarifiers and accelerate the suspended biological solids settling in the secondary clarifiers.
The range of products, including antifoams, is designed to ensure the discharge of quality water to meet the local environmental standard parameters as required. In addition are also available sludge dewatering aids able to reduce the volume and moisture of the sludge, reducing problems and cost associated with solid waste disposal.
A wide range of products and services are available for the Paper industry, providing full range of chemicals for corrosion, deposit, foam and microbiological control,
Advanced polymers technology is available for retention and drainage aids, and recovery fibres as well. Products range includes:
Slimicide agents: to control and eliminate problems due to slime formation in wet-end circuits. The range of KEMIND products is based on specific active ingredients which grant the best
performance in many different environmental conditions.
Preservative agents for Clays, CaCarbonates and Coatings: Microbiological control of the coating color and its components is essential to grant correct application at constant viscosity and
rheology properties. KEMIND is present in above fields with specific products which control bacterial proliferation, avoiding dispersion deterioration.
Pitch Control: When coated paper or waste paper are used as raw material, latex or pitches can precipitate on the wire and felts. This will spoil them and negatively affect paper quality.
KEMIND is able to offer a wide range of dispersant and fixative agents which are effective in different conditions and keep the problem under control.
Control of scale formation in vacuum pumps and cooling systems: A typical inconvenient in paper mills is the scale formation in vacuum pumps and in cooling systems with adverse effect on their
performance. KEMIND produces a range of specialty chemicals to deal with that problem. Antifoam agents: full range of suitable products to foam in stocks, coatings, surface treatments and
waste waters is available.
Improvement of mechanical characteristic of paper: KEMIND introduced to the marketplace specifically modified grades of CMC to use in the paper manufacturing process with excellent
performances and at lower cost. This newest dry strength technology offered by KEMIND, named Kemicel 100, consist of an Anionic Controlled Cellulose Ether characterized by low etherification (low anionic charge) to allow better control of the ion charge during paper manufacturing, and low degree of polymerization avoiding a negative impact on the drainage.
Brightness improvement: In a many cases the partial removal, or in some case the total removal of traditional OBA with a different type of specific brightener enhancer will significantly increase the
perceived whiteness of the paper sheet. KEMIND developed a specifically modified OBA able to better fix itself on groundwood fibres, enhancing
the brightness effect.
Wire and Felt washing: KEMIND offers products (acid, alkaline or solvent based) to keep wires and felts clean and efficient, thereby extending their life. Particularly good and experienced
performance is obtained with foaming products, both acid and alkaline. The range of products includes complex foaming and liquid formulations specifically designed for cleaning
and sanitization of:
Long and short wet end loops.
- Felt
- Wire
- Dryer fabric
- Coating stations
Together with products KEMIND also provides dedicated washing systems operating manually and/or automatically. These systems are specifically designed to reduce product consumption and
environmental impact and also to improve the application performance and operators safety. Paper machine wash-up: KEMIND produces specialty chemicals that can be added to the washing
water to provide complete sanitation and cleaning. Both acid or alkaline chemicals are available for this type of application.
Products for repulping wet strength paper: speciality chemicals added to the pulper in order to make easy repulping of wet strength paper.
Retention & Aids Agents: typical retention & aids agents (cationic/anionic PAM ) or silica colloidal system are available in the portfolio of KEMIND. The synergetic action between silica
based product and cationic starch or cationic PAM could be an alternative retention system above all to improve retention of fines and different fillers (clay, CaCO3, TiO2 etc.).
Yankee coating application: For the specific sector of tissue paper production, KEMIND is able to provide advanced coating technology for the protection of the Yankee cylinder, and also able to
improve softness to the paper sheet. Tissue coating programs include Adhesive and release agents, modifiers and specific formulations controlling Yankee corrosion. The appropriate chemical feeding system is also available, and the design of spray boom will be specifically prepared by KEMIND per each paper machine.
Wet strength resin: KEMIND also included in its portfolio the newest technologies of wet strength resin products to use in the tissue paper industry. Innovative formulations have been developed with low organic chlorine content without varying wet strength efficiency, and also a more active concentrated products able to reduce the impact of
AOX content of the effluent are available.
Softeners for tissue paper and bulk products: KEMIND’s softeners added to paper stock furnish will promote softness in the final sheet Alkaline and Neutral Sizing Technology: The portfolio includes the most significant products currently used in printing & writing and board Paper Mills. Sizing products range includes AKD (Alkyl Kethen Dimer) based chemicals for alkaline sizing
process and Dispersed Cationic Rosin based chemicals for neutral sizing process.
VALUE ADDED SERVICES
Efficient delivering of technology requires to be properly structured, sized and organized to profitably compete in today’s marketplace, and improving continuously productivity and effectiveness in our field organization is an absolute necessity. KEMIND strongly feels that focus on the customer historically has been our formula for winning in the marketplace, but never has it been more important than it is now.
Our future depends on improving customer loyalty, staying close to them to understand their unique technical challenges and business issues. We strongly believe that the concept of “team approach” in servicing provides the greatest treatment performances and a greater value on the return of the investment for the customer. Therefore we respond with a consistently superior portfolio of global products and services.
Both a routine analytical testing and technical support services are provided close to customers through the local KEMIND representative in order to react very quickly to the immediate customer needs, and a non-routine high-level and advanced services including application audits, inspections, technical training, specific and advanced analytical tests are provided by the KEMIND corporate customer support units through specific experts and studies helping customers to achieve the plant objectives.
Routine services: include mainly testing of water samples collected form all treated systems, microbiological testing and bacteria evaluation, water saturation index evaluation, corrosion and fouling monitoring through appropriate coupons, equipment inspections, chemical inventory monitoring, etc.
A wide range of portable and up-to-date instruments for the paper process control can be also leased to customers. This allows direct in-field operability which, coupled with the precious cooperation of the paper-mill personnel, results in the possibility of targeted operations of high technical level.
KEMIND strongly believes as fundamental importance to ensure that adequate metering equipment is used for the recommended chemicals and their correct application in the system. To facilitate routine communication with customer management and operators on duty, after each service visit, a treatment applications review is prepared by local responsible KEMIND representative, detailing testing and the status of all applications in order to review all discrepancies with control parameters and identify the need for corrective action when necessary.
Non routine services : In addition to the standard laboratory equipment, KEMIND corporate technical department is well equipped with advanced-technology instrumentation allowing quick response times and highly precise quality analysis. These laboratory capabilities include also special analysis on water samples, paper sheet, organic/inorganic deposits, bacteria identifications, enabling to better understand any change in the systems in order to take the necessary actions, and/or to implement and develop new update treatment programs.
KEMIND believes the importance of training as it relates to the application of chemicals in industrial systems cannot be underestimated.
Multiple levels of training are prepared in order to ensure that the knowledge and understanding of basic water treatment principles, paper process applications technology, troubleshooting and methodology have been transferred to the plant operators and managers. Customized workbooks including information on specific plant systems and applications, schematics and control procedures are prepared and delivered to each operator attending the training sessions.
Seminars prepared for specific applications are also periodically offered by KEMIND as needed basis. These seminars are primarily geared to operations and utilities management personnel as
well as lead maintenance supervisors and management.
New techniques designed to improve process performances, product quality, plant thermal efficiencies, energy and water saving, water reuse are a major portion of this program. In addition, as the need arises, also KEMIND holds local seminars to emphasize new technologies and/or specialized topics.