Sustainability-Recycled Paper

Sustainability means living in a way that will create a future for all people to flourish while keeping the planet balanced and healthy. Using as little as the earth’s resources as possible so there will be enough for future generations to flourish as well. This also helps us with our landfill issues as living sustain-ably creates less waste.

How can we do this while still living our normal busy lifestyles?

This simplest thing we can do is to recycle. In our homes, our offices and simple curbside recycling.  Reuse items within our own homes. Those pesky #6 plastics that most cities don’t recycle can be used to hold children’s art supplies, small toys or nuts and bolts. I save a few and throw out a few until the ones I used need replacing. Oddly, I feel guilty when I throw any of them away, but realistically I know there is only so much I can do with those things. Old clothing can be given to charity instead of thrown out. If you are lucky enough to know a quilter, they almost always appreciate donations. Buy refillable bottles and a water filter instead of plastic water bottles. For larger items there 4,184 free cycle groups, you can list things you want to give away or look for things you would like for free.

I recycle most food scraps, newspaper, leaves etc by composting. This also saves my septic tank from unneeded matter and gives me the most amazing free organic fertilizer! There are so many ways we can recycle or reuse items in our homes with little or no effort.

Taking sustainability a step further to using recycled paper products in our homes and offices.

Let’s take a look at why we should…keep in mind these numbers are only for office paper usage.

Paper Facts

• 1 ton of paper = 400 reams = 200,000 sheets
• 1 tree makes 16.67 reams of copy paper or 8,333 sheets
• 1 ream (500 sheets) uses 6% of a tree (and those add up quickly)

 

 

 

Printing Facts

• Average cost of a wasted page $0.06
• Average employee prints 6 wasted pages per day, that’s 1,410 wasted pages per year!
• The average U.S. office worker prints 10,000 pages per year

 

 

 

Consumption

• In 2004 the United States used 8 million tons of office paper (3.2 billion reams). That’s the equivalent of 178 million trees!
• The U.S. is by far the world’s largest producer and consumer of paper. Per capita U.S. paper consumption is over six times greater than the world average.
• In the United States, we use enough office paper each year to build a 10-foot-high wall that’s 6,815 miles long. That’s more than the distance from New York to Tokyo!

 

 

 

Growth

• Global paper products consumption has tripled over the past three decades and is expected to grow by half again before 2010.

 

 

 

Energy

• The U.S. pulp and paper industry is the second largest consumer of energy and uses more water to produce a ton of product than any other industry.
• Production of 1 ton of copy paper uses 11,134 kWh (same amount of energy used by an avg household in 10 months)

 

 

 

Water

• Making one single sheet of copy paper can use over 13oz. of water– more than a typical soda can.
• Production of 1 ton of copy paper produces 19,075 gallons of waste water

 

 

 

Waste

• One ton of paper requires the use of 98 tons of various resources.
• In 2003, paper and paperboard accounted for 35 percent of the total materials discarded in the United States.
• Production of 1 ton of copy paper produces 2,278 lb of solid waste

 

 

 

CO2

• Production of 1 ton of copy paper produces 5,690 lb. of green house gases (the equivalent of 6months of car exhaust).
• Dumping paper in landfill adds methane to the atmosphere as it decomposes, with 20 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide.

 

 

 

Forests

• In the U.S. we have lost 95 percent of our old growth forests.
• In North America many of these forests are later turned into tree farms. Tree farms are not biologically diverse and the result is a loss of wildlife habitat and soil erosion
• Old growth forests make up 16% of the virgin tree fiber used each year to make paper products.
• 4281 acres of rainforest are lost every hour worldwide
• It takes 3 tons of wood to produce 1 ton of copy paper.

 

 

 

Tree Facts

• A single mature tree can release enough oxygen back into the atmosphere to support 2 human beings.
• Each person in the U.S. generates approximately 2.3 tons of CO2 each year.
• If every American family planted just one tree, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere would be reduced by one billion lbs annually. This is almost 5% of the amount that human activity pumps into the atmosphere each year.
• According to the USDA Forest Service, a tree generates $31,250 worth of oxygen, provides $62,000 worth of air pollution control, recycles $37,500 worth of water, and controls $31,250 worth of soil erosion, over a 50-year life span.

 

 

 

Recycled Paper Products

• Using recycled paper reduces the pressure on the world’s forests because recycled paper is made from paper, not from trees. The process of recycling is specialized and not every type of paper can be mixed together. Take for example newspapers and cardboard boxes; they must be separated before they can be used to produce different recycled paper products. Recycled paper is made after waste paper is de-inked and all fillers, clays and fiber fragments are removed from it. Then it is cooked and remanufactured back into usable pulp.

 

 

 

 

Recycled papers benefit our environment

 

• Paper mills require lots of energy to make paper from wood fiber. Paper fiber called cellulous must be separated from a tree’s natural glue called lignin. Several energy intensive steps must be performed to finally produce a paper sheet.
• Hazardous chlorine is also often used to bleach the pulp.
• Paper mills fulfill some of their energy needs by burning coal, oil, wood scraps and also often must purchase additional energy from the local power companies. An abundance of water is also required to manufacturer paper.

 

 

 

Manufacturing recycled papers is advantageous because:

• It saves more than 40% of the energy resources.
• It requires less water.
• Saves on landfill space.
• Manufacturing of recycled papers requires fewer chemicals and bleaching materials as compared to the virgin paper production.
• Recycled paper production significantly decreases air and water pollution.
• Consider that chemicals used in paper manufacturing produce various types of by-products and gasses. Solid waste material is usually dumped somewhere on the land, liquid waste is generally flushed into streams or the sea and gasses are left in open air contributing to global warming. Recycled paper companies are comparatively earth friendly. They not only produce less waste but are also reducing the need to landfill or incinerate our paper trash.
• Paper recycling helps conserve our forests.

Recycled paper is the choice of the present and future. If we use recycled paper products it will not only save more trees but ultimately help save our planet from global warming.

Even though I have recycled and used recycled products for years, I was astounded by most of these facts!

Our government standards require that a mere 10% of post consumer waste be in a product to be labeled as recycled, so remember to check for the amount of post consumer waste. Many papers out there are 100% post consumer waste.

For more detailed information on the environmental impact of paper use and the alternatives you can use this handy paper calculator created by Environmental Defense at

 

 

 

papercalculator.org As a home school mom and new business owner, my responsibilities have come into play, so the next in this series will be this weekend. Besides recycled…I’ll be looking into alternative paper sources. Hope you’ll be reading!

Great alternative paper products!

  

       

 

 

 

 

 

~ by digitalpoetry on December 6, 2007.