�

The consumption of paper, the natural vehicle for culture, education and communication, is a good indicator of how developed a country is. It is made out of natural and renewable raw materials -wood pulp and water-, it is biodegradable and nearly 100 % recyclable, which makes it one of the most ecological materials in existence.

�

However, developed countries devour paper without any thought to the industrial process which goes into making a sheet of paper and without considering the impact that its production has on the environment. The FAO (Food and Agriculture Organisation) has warned that the world consumption of paper will rise from the 286 million tonnes used in 1996, to 396 million tonnes by the year 2010. Spain is no exception: according to the National Association of Pulp, Paper and Cardboard Manufacturers (ASPAPEL), in Spain we consume 32% more paper now than we did five years ago. A rate which the Earth will be unable to cope with unless we change the way we produce and consume paper.

�

The more paper we consume, the more trees we need. Although cellulose, the raw material from which paper pulp is made, is found in all vegetable tissues, more than half of all the cellulose used to make paper comes from wood. This consumption accounts for 19% of the worldwide extraction of wood. In the year 2000, in Spain alone we used five and a half million cubic metres of wood from forests planted with fast growing species, such as the eucalyptus, the Monterey pine and the poplar.

�

The manufacture of paper also requires a great deal of water which is used during every stage of the process. During the wood pulping process water is used to wash the wood, to separate the cellulose fibres from the lignin -the other component of wood- and to bleach the pulp. Before it goes through the paper production line which converts it into paper, the wood pulp is again mixed with water to refine it; and in the final stage of the process water is used to ensure that the cellulose fibres pass through the machine�s rollers as an even and consistent sheet. The manufacture of paper also consumes a great deal of energy: to produce one tonne of paper 9,600 kwh or 0.4 TOE (tonnes of oil equivalent) is required.

�

This is why long before the selective collection of urban waste started in Spain, there was already talk about the importance of recycling paper, and there were people who earned a living collecting used paper and cardboard. This is hardly surprising if you think that a tonne of recovered paper can be used to obtain the same amount of cellulose fibre as 3.5 cubic metres of wood; and that in order to get that wood you would have to cut down between 12 and 14 fifteen year old trees. To make a tonne of recycled paper also requires water, among other reasons to separate the cellulose fibres and to eliminate ink residue, but only 8 cubic metres, as opposed to the approximately 15 cubic metres which would be needed if the raw material were wood. And energy consumption is reduced to 6,600 kWh (0.15 TEP).

�

These environmental advantages are all very well, but there is still a long road to travel. The Spanish only recycled 49 % of the 6.8 million tonnes of paper and cardboard which they consumed in 2000. From the remaining 51% of non-recycled paper, we need to subtract the 15% of paper which is kept, in the form of books or documents, or destroyed, like toilet paper. This means that 36% of all the paper is consumed in Spain ends up on landfills or in incinerators, which is a terrible waste. Especially considering that the Spanish rate of utilisation of recovered paper, or in other words, the percentage of recovered paper used to make pulp in Spain, is greater than 81%. Paradoxically Spanish paper companies have to import 17 % of the recovered paper they use, while every year in Spain nearly 2.5 million tonnes of this raw material are dumped on landfills or burnt in incinerators.

�

In common with most industrial processes, the manufacture of paper has an important impact on the environment. In particular, the transformation of wood into pulp by chemical means, which is the method used for short fibre wood in Spain, produces polluted waste water as well as emissions into the atmosphere of gases like carbon dioxide (CO2), sulphur dioxide (SO2) and hydrogen sulphide (H2S), which is responsible for that unpleasant smell which pervades the area around paper mills. Also, the pulp usually undergoes a bleaching process to eliminate the residual lignin which would otherwise darken it. In the past this process, which also makes paper accept printing better and gives it greater durability, caused the most serious impact on the environment that the paper industry was responsible for, since the bleaching process used chlorine gas or elemental gas which led to harmful organochlorate waste products.

�

However, the paper industry is doing its best to lose its traditionally poor environmental image. More and more companies are getting their wood from sustainably managed forests and in the last 15 years the consumption of energy and water per tonne of paper produced has been reduced by up to 60% and 66%, respectively. Since the 70s, emissions of sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere have been cut back by 90% and the amount of pollution by waste water produced by the process has also diminished significantly. In addition organochlorate compounds have been cut by 90% thanks to pulp bleached by elemental chlorine being replaced by elemental chlorine free pulp (EFC) or totally chlorine free pulp (TFC). ECF pulp is pre-bleached with oxygen and then bleached with chlorine dioxide. TFC pulp, bleached with oxygen and hydrogen peroxide, is much more environment friendly since no organochlorate compounds are produced. However, the bulk of Spanish production is still based on EFC pulp.
�
We all have to work at reconciling our need for paper and cardboard with the limited natural resources at our disposal. And you, as a consumer, can do a lot, starting by using recycled paper. It is no more expensive, nor does it last less than normal paper, and it can be used in printers and photocopiers. But be careful to read the labels properly. Just because paper is recycled does not necessarily mean that it is ecological, because while it may use recovered fibre, it may involve a polluting productive process. As with any other kind of paper there are different qualities of recycled paper. But when you need a really high quality paper for reasons of presentation, the best ecological option is virgin totally chlorine free fibre (TFC). Ecological paper is paper made from virgin pulp bleached without chlorine (TFC), but the description chlorine free paper on labels tends to include EFC paper.

�

If you want to be sure that the paper you buy does not contain chlorine, choose a brand which is certified by some official body. And, even more importantly, do not waste paper. Because, among other reasons, no paper is one hundred percent recycled since a small proportion of virgin fibre is always used to ensure its functionality. Try not to use disposable one-use paper products paper, like tissues, kitchen roll, serviettes, plates and cups. Avoid over-packaged goods and make the maximum use of school and office stationery. Reuse all the paper you can: keep gift wrapping paper and use it again, write on both sides of a sheet of paper and don't throw away reusable envelopes. And, whatever you do, don�t forget to use the blue recycling bins.

DID YOU KNOW...?
- The Spanish consume an average of 171 kilos of paper and cardboard a year: more than 78 kilos of packaging, nearly 50 kilos of printed and writing� paper, 16 kilos of newspapers, a little over 11 kilos of toilet paper and 15 kilos of other kinds of paper. Spain is the twentieth biggest consumer of paper and cardboard in the world. (Source: ASPAPEL Statistical Report 2000).

�

- There are 457 varieties of paper and 36 types of pulp, which gives you an idea of the versatility of this material. Depending on its end use, paper is manufactured with different grammage, thickness, stiffness, smoothness, porosity, absorbency, impermeability, moisture content, strength, printability, etc.

�

- A modern paper production line is one of the largest pieces of industrial machinery made nowadays. Some are as much as 300 metres long, have more microchips than an aeroplane and produce more than 2,000 metres of paper a minute, a daily production equivalent to a 7 metre wide strip of paper running from A Coru�a to C�diz.

�

- The first recorded paper mill in Europe was built in J�tiva, in the 11th century. In the present day, Spain has 15 cellulose or pulp plants and 132 factories which convert this pulp into 4.8 million tonnes of paper a year. Spain is the seventh biggest producer in the European Union, after Germany, Finland, Sweden, France, Italy and the UK.

�

- ENCE, Spain�s leading cellulose producing company, has three plants in Huelva, Navia (Asturias) and Pontevedra. Since 1997, the Pontevedra plant has produced nothing but chlorine free pulp.