GUIDED INDUSTRY TOURS MAP EDMONTON
The Whitecourt and District Chamber of Commerce, in partnership with the Alberta Newsprint Company (ANP), Millar Western Forest Products, and Whitecourt Power LP offers free guided tours. Depending on current plant operations, tours are available during summer months on weekdays from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. You can make tour arrangements by contacting the Whitecourt and District Chamber of Commerce at 780-778-5363.
Alberta Newsprint Company
Location: 10 km northwest of Whitecourt. Travel on Hwy 43 north to the Hwy 32 junction; turn left onto the marked Alberta Newsprint Company access road; travel about 1 km to enter the main parking lot.
The province’s only papermaking facility, the Alberta Newsprint Company produces about 720 metric tons of newsprint each day or 260,000 metric tons per year, which translates to approximately 1,400 metres per minute, or 84 kilometres each hour. The paper is made from 95 percent thermochemical pulp that uses sawmill waste residuals and five percent recycled content from de-inked newspapers and magazines. Tours show the papermaking process from start to finish.
Millar Western Forest Products
Location: 5004-52nd Street, Whitecourt, at the confluence of the Athabasca and McLeod Rivers.
The $40 million Millar Western sawmill in Whitecourt opened in 2001. A single-line sawmill, it produces dimensional lumber using more than 7,000 logs in an eight-hour shift. Every year, about 900,000 cubic metres of tree length are brought in and cut to length to produce more than 200 million board feet of kiln-dried lumberenough to erect 11,000 average-size single-family homes. The tour shows visitors the daily operations involved in running the mill.
Eric S. Huestis Demonstration Forest
Location: About 13 km north of Whitecourt on Hwy 32.
Info: The front gate is open from May to October. 780-778-7153.
Visit the 10-square-kilometre Eric S. Huestis Demonstration Forest for a great hike and to see how a forest can be managed to provide recreation opportunities, wildlife habitat, and harvesting over an extended time period. Established in the late 1980s, the Eric S. Huestis Demonstration Forest includes five cutblocks (an area authorized for logging) of aspen, pine, spruce, mixed wood, and exotic species. Until recently, industrial activity such as oil and gas production has been limited here. A seven-kilometre trek leads past 26 interpretive sites that illustrate stages of forest life.
