International Paper is distributing a series of brochures under the title of  DOWN TO EARTH, A Practical Look At Environmental Issues And Trends. They are thought provoking and well-designed. I tell you this upfront because it is always good to know the source. In this case it is a paper company making a case for paper, so be sure to take it with a grain of wood pulp.

The brochure I have on my desk in front of me asks the question, Are Pixels Greener Than Paper? I never really thought about it, but if I had I suppose my answer would be, “Of course, pixels are greener than paper.” After all you don’t have to harvest a tree for a blip on the screen.  Right? Well I was surprised to learn:

• 

  20% less CO2

  “Twenty percent less CO2 is used per year by a person reading a daily printed newspaper versus a person reading  web-based news for 30 minutes a day.”

• “On average it takes 500 kilowatt-hours of electricity to produce 440 lbs. of paper, the typical amount of paper each of us consumes annually. That’s the equivalent of powering one computer continuously for five months.”
• 

  60% energy increase

  “It costs an estimated $2.8 billion [in] energy to leave computers sitting idle overnight in the U.S. alone. On a CO2 basis, that’s 20 million tons of carbon dioxide, about the amount produced by four million cars on the road.”

• “A government study estimates that the rise in gadget ownership and the switch from analogue to digital TV could boost the electricity usage of the consumer electronic sector by 60 percent by 2010.”

There is more to report on this issue and International paper recommends the following sites for further information: ipsustainability.com ; abudantforests.org ; epa.gov ; fsc.org ; iea.org ; pefc.org ; sfiprogram.org ; iplifeoftheforest.com

Next: Sustainability and Recyclability

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I don’t know if it is media caused, but the whole country seems to be in the grip of Chicken Little syndrome. We think the sky is falling just because someone else tells us it is. If you listen to the “experts” they’d have you believe that we are on the doorstep of doom and destruction. Greenhouse gasses, global warming, polluted water and air, my goodness you’d think we had “one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel”, as my former scoutmaster used to say.

In the 70′s there was a hew and cry about cutting down trees and the paper industry responded by creating recycled paper. It was truly u-g-l-y and didn’t print worth a da_ n, but it was environmentally friendly. Whew. Since then the paper mills have been refining their techniques. There are mills that recycle everything. What they can’t use in the product, they recycle to produce energy to run the mill. No waste. You’d be hard pressed to find a paper stock now that doesn’t contain some percentage of recycled fiber, and the days of ugly, unprintable paper are gone. Some of the most beautiful sheets around are recycled.

But what about the trees? Aren’t we destroying forests for toilet tissue and newspapers? No, we aren’t. Again, the people spoke, the government listened, and the industry responded. Today, according to some, we have more forested acres in the United States than existed in colonial times.  That may or may not be true, but we have not seen wholesale devastation of our forests either. There are plenty of trees out there, and when harvested for lumber or paper the land is replanted with new trees. Take a drive to the Pacific Northwest and notice the many lumber farms. Now we can grow trees like we grow corn and harvest them without bulldozing a mountainside.

I’ve mentioned twice now how industries change direction to meet the wants and needs of the public, do you doubt that it is true? Companies exist to serve the people. If the people don’t buy their products or services, they go out of business. Kaput. Finis. All change is hard. Companies are unwilling to make changes unless they can see that it will pay off. Going green has been paying off and so you will continue to see more innovations. I’m certain of it.

I’ve focused mainly on paper, but printing presses have changed also. Thirty years ago heat-set web presses burned off the ink solvents in drying ovens and released them into the air. I didn’t know that in addition to stinking up my clothes, it was also fouling my lungs. Now, by law, these presses come equipped with scrubbers that clean and vent the air to the outside.

Ink has changed as well. 100% Petroleum based inks are rare. Today inks are created with soy and petroleum.

So what am I getting at? The sky is not falling. The printing business is environmentally aware, and there will be trees to climb, and water to swim in for innumberable generations to come. Don’t get in an uproar because we truly are greeener than you think.

Almost all paper is made from either wood pulp, cotton, or a combination of the two. It’s not the base that is the significant factor in the wide variety of paper on the market. The processing at the paper mills makes all of the difference. Developing a new product line is a monumental task. Decisions have to be made at the very beginning. For example, before sheet one is produced, marketing must be considered. Who will buy this paper? Will this new line increase total sales or erode sales from another paper in our product line? How much will it cost to make it, including possible new tooling? How do we position this paper in the marketplace? What will we emphasize most, price, uniqueness, printability, or quality?

Why should the paper making issues  make any difference to you as a consumer? If you were to see the figures the printer has to consider in estimating  a printing bid, you would note that the cost of paper is routinely 30-60% of the cost. The bigger the job the greater the percentage of paper cost. Why is it so much? In addition to all the R&D, the short answer is that it takes a big expensive facility to manufacture paper in the volumes needed to supply the needs. Just how expensive? The cost of building a new mill today is well over a billion dollars. To give you an idea of how much real estate is needed for a typical mill here is a photo of  the Blue Heron Paper Mill in Oregon, USA.

Blue Heron Paper Mill

Paper mills have been subjected to the same pressures we all experience in this business climate. Their manufacturing costs have increased dramatically, in part because of  raw materials. Environmental laws have made harvesting of trees more expensive, and mills have been forced to comply with demanding clean air and water regulations. Regulations which have forced retrofitting the plants with new equipment to meet EPA standards. Some mills, unable to afford the retrofits have shut down. Mills in United States face world wide competition that keeps the sell prices low even in the face of these higher costs. So the paper mills are squeezed.

Again, why should this matter? It matters to all of us because we have enjoyed a golden age of amazing paper options. If new mills are unable to be built, and older mills close up shop, the availability will decrease. In steps that old law of supply and demand, with decreased supply, a steady demand will force the costs up. The final buyer of printing will see their printing bills increasing, and more companies will  consider options other than printing. When companies slow orders of printed materials, printers will suffer. With a drop off of paper orders, more mills will close. It’s the proverbial vicious cycle. I don’t know about you, but I’m not quite ready to see printing become a quaint curiosity is some dusty museum. There is still something  to be said about the feel and permanence of a printed piece that just can’t be duplicated with electronic blips on a computer monitor.