Wednesday, June 22, 2016 12:00 pm

PORTLAND, Maine (From The Bangor Daily News) -- Cascades Inc. plans to close its de-inked pulp mill in Auburn on July 15, laying off 45 employees at the facility that uses recycled paper to make packaging and tissue products.

The Quebec-based Cascades announced the closure Wednesday, saying the mill had low potential to integrate with its other operations as the overall market has dwindled for printing and writing paper and de-inked, or recycled, pulp.

"Despite major efforts to optimize in the past year, the situation at the plant remained extremely difficult. Therefore, we are unfortunately forced to cease operations" Luc Langevin, president and chief operating officer of Cascade's specialty papers group, said in a news release.

The company plans to end production at the Auburn plant July 8 and will close July 15.

The company said it would explore relocating staff in Auburn to other plants and would assist employees to find new jobs. Cascades, publicly traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange, has about 90 production facilities in North America and Europe, with about 11,000 employees.

Its Auburn plant is the only producer of de-inked pulp in the Northeast.

The company did not say what it will do with the property following the closure.

"Cascades wishes to extend its sincere thanks to all Cascades Auburn Fiber employees for their loyalty since 1998 and for all the efforts made in an attempt to save the plant," the news release states. "The company is counting on them to serve customers until closing."