University of Virginia Library

environment

By MARY ANN HUEY

If you throw this CD in a
wastebasket or leave it lying
around for someone else to
throw out, you are not only
inconsiderate, but also a
burden to the rest of us who
are learning to recycle our
resources.

Forests are not limitless and
paper companies are not able
to immediately replace the
forests they devastate to
manufacture paper. As Garrett
De Belle states in The
Environmental Handbook, "demands on our forests have
become so great that there is
now pressure for more intense
management of timber to
increase annual production.
Those of us who prefer
wilderness and maximum areas
of unmanaged forests would
prefer that the demand for
timber be reduced by
increasing the percentage that
is recycled."

Those of you who could
care less about the beauty of
virgin timber might be
interested in the health and
well-being of man. The
production of new pulp is a
dirty, energy-consuming
process. "For the sulphate
pulping process, this pollution
includes 275 pounds of sulfur,
350 pounds of limestone,
60,000 gallons of water, 9,000
pounds of steam, and 225
kilowatt-hours of electricity,
per ton of unbleached pulp."
(User's Guide to the Protection
of the Environment)

What happens to paper put
in Friends of the Earth boxes
and collected by ZPG every
first Saturday? Coiners' Scrap
and Metal, Inc. pays the
ecology groups 8 per ton of
newsprint delivered to him.

Coiner's sorts the paper into
various grades, newsprint, IBM
cards, and manifold ledger. The
paper is then packaged in 1700
pound bales and shipped to
mills where the recycling
process begins.

The bales are mixed
according to formula to arrive
at the proper consistency of
the new paper. There are
different formulas for different
qualities of paper.

This mixture is then treated
with water and chopped to a
liquid. The liquid goes through
a cooling and pressing process
and comes out in large rolls or
sheets. The finished product is
usually sold to box and
container companies.

Mr. Coiner receives 150 tons
of paper a month. "Since
ecology became a household
word, our tonnage has
increased 200%," he said.

The pulp of one tree
produces a stack of newsprint
36 inches high. This thirty-six
inch stack of newsprint also
takes up valuable space in the
city and county landfill sites.
The future will require more
drastic measures to protect
natural resources by recycling.