Investigating the Life Cycle of Paper

You’re probably already very familiar with seeing recycled paper products on the shelves of your local office supply store. But how often do you consider the entire life cycle of paper – all types of paper – we consume, including packaging, posters, event banners, business cards, brochures, hang tags and labels?

INFORM, a nonprofit organization, has put together a website exploring the connection between paper production and global warming as part of their The Secret Life Series. INFORM’s research and their well-produced Secret Life of Paper video helps us answer the question, “Why is recycling and buying recycled paper important?”

The paper life cycle can be broken down in to six distinct stages: forest, manufacturing, use, exports, recovery and end of life. A good amount of information exists on the environmental and social damages of each of these stages, but a few key points to keep in mind are:

• About 80 percent of the ancient forests have already been destroyed for fuel and raw materials.
• The paper production process releases sulfur oxides and chlorine compounds into the atmosphere. And the use of bleaching chemicals leads to water pollution.
• Clearing forests affects animals’ access to food and shelter and creates space for species not native to the forest floor.
• Roughly 80 percent of all paper can be recycled, yet only 15 percent of our paper waste stream is being recycled.
• When left decompose in landfills, paper gives off methane. As a greenhouse gas, methane is 23 times more harmful than carbon dioxide.
• Replacing five reams of virgin forest paper in each household with 100 percent recycled copy paper would save 33,485,200 trees, 2.9 billion pounds of greenhouse gases and 12.2 billion gallons of water.
• Producing recycled paper requires two to three times less energy, reduces air pollution by 75 percent and saves 60 percent of water pollution (compared to virgin paper).
• About five hectares of forest are saved per ton of recycled paper production.

When we talk about products in terms of their ecobalance, or life cycle assessment, we sometimes defer to terms like cradle-to-grave, cradle-to-cradle and gate-to-gate (just to name a few). These conversations are, unfortunately, often too few and far between. The Secret Life of Paper, Paper Life Cycle and Greenerprinter.com are great places to learn more about the ecobalance of paper.

When per capita paper use has actually increased since the advent of home computers (1980s) and today we are facing peak everything, it’s critical that we do everything we can now to reduce paper use, increase use of recycled paper and close the loop in the paper life cycle. And here at Greenerprinter, we are committed to doing just that.

Thank you for considering the entire lifecyle of paper and for making a difference through your everyday choices!