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The pulp and paper industry faces several challenges linked to climate and environmental impact, resource efficiency, rising energy prices, increased competition for biomass resources, and declining demand for traditional printed paper products. However, these challenges also offer strategic opportunities for the industry to develop into a competitive, resource-efficient, and low-carbon industry in line with a biobased economy. Against this background, this paper aims to analyse current energy strategies in the pulp and paper industry in Sweden. Specifically, the paper analyses how companies combine continuous process efficiency to reduce energy costs with activities that could be developed into new energy-related products to increase revenue. Most of the analysed companies work to various degrees with both these strategies, employing methods that include improving energy efficiency, energy security, and energy conversion, as well as developing a wide range of biobased energy products. However, our study indicates that there is an untapped potential associated with energy product development, and we conclude that energy efficiency measures can free up resources, enabling the development of new energy products. Finally, several potential managerial outcomes and implications are outlined. • The paper analyses the energy strategies in the pulp and paper industry in Sweden. • Energy strategies focus both to improve energy efficiency and develop new energy-products. • The companies' energy strategies combined exploitation and exploration. • A number of managerial implications are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Previous studies point out a large (untapped) potential for energy efficiency in industry through the adoption of energy management practices. The aim of this paper is to describe and analyze energy management practices in two different Swedish energy-intensive industries: the pulp and paper industry and the foundry industry. The results show that one third of the studied mills and about two fifths of the studied foundries do not allocate energy costs by means of sub-metering, which probably contributes to reinforce the split incentive problem. Moreover, about one fifth of the mills and about half of the foundries lack a long-term energy strategy. The results also show that only about 40% and 25% respectively of the studied mills and foundries may be categorized as successful when it comes to energy management practices. If energy management is not fully prioritized even in energy-intensive industries – such as the studied foundry and pulp- and paper industry it will, in all probability, not be prioritized in less energy-intensive industrial sectors or countries either, indicating a large untapped potential in regard to cleaner, more environmentally sound, production in the industrial sector. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The EU has established so-called 20–20–20 targets, which in relation to energy mean that each Member State shall improve energy intensity levels by 3.3% annually, leading to a reduced primary energy use of 20% by the year 2020, calculated from a projected level based on the primary energy use in 2005. Sweden has established a less ambitious target of 1.7% annual energy intensity improvement through 2020. The aim of this paper is to evaluate, ex-ante, the EU 2020 primary energy target for the Swedish industrial sector. An applied backcasting methodology is used. The assessment made in this paper is that actions that lead to between 31.6 and 33.2 TWh/year reductions in energy end-use are needed if the EU target is to be achieved. Results from this paper shows that the current energy policy instruments are not sufficient to the EU or Swedish targets. Estimations in this paper are that a primary energy target of about 22.3 TWh/year is reasonable. The paper concludes by presenting a roadmap on how the Swedish 2020 target can be achieved through: i) energy management; ii) energy-efficient technology; and iii) energy supply measures, with an approximate cost of 280–300 MEUR or 75–80 kWh per public EUR. Three major additional policy measures are needed compared with the current policy: including all energy carriers, not just electricity, in the Swedish long-term agreements program PFE; setting up networks; and making it possible for third parties, i.e., industry, to deliver excess heat into the monopolized Swedish district heating grids. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]