Modelling of suspended solids effluent from a pulp and paper mill

Sammanfattning: This study examines the wastewater treatment system on BillerudKorsnäs integrated pulpand paper mill at Karlsborg, with focus on the effluent of suspended solids. Due to lowerregulatory limits for the emissions of suspended solids BillerudKorsnäs is looking forways to improve the efficiency of the wastewater treatment. Therefore, this study seeksto create a statistical model for the emissions of suspended solids and to find which factorsin the production, wastewater treatment and surrounding environment that affects theemissions. The purpose of the study is to extend the current understanding of the treatmentsystem to create a base for future decisions. The methods used for the modelling areElastic net regression and Random forest classifier, which were selected for the variableselection properties they provide. Unfortunately, the results show that the fitted modelscan only explain a small part of the variation of the emissions of suspended solids.The lack of fit in the models indicate that the current data is not sufficient to explain thevariation in the emissions of suspended solids. During the study deficiencies in the datacollection has been detected and improvements to overcome these deficiencies are proposedin the hope of creating more reliable data for the company and to create a betterbasis for future studies.