Different Ways of Paper Making
Industrial paper making
- very informative video
- was so interesting to see how all the machinery works and the state change
Homemade paper
- gonna try this
- so cute and also looks kinda expensive
- gourmet paper
sooo interesting there's so many types of paper making and traditional ways of doing so
but all follow very similar steps.
Environmental Effects of the Paper Industry
Paper pollution refers to environmental pollution caused by the production, use and recycling of paper. Paper pollution causes severe adverse effects to the quality of air, water and land. Discarded paper is a major component of many landfill sites.
Pulp and paper is the third largest industrial polluter to air, water, and land in the United States, and studies show that it releases well over 100 million kg of toxic pollution each year.
The main components of pulp mill related pollution are chlorine and chlorine based materials, sulfur, hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide. Chlorine and compounds of chlorine are used in the bleaching of wood pulp, especially chemical pulps produced by the kraft process or sulfite process. Plants using elemental chlorine produced significant quantities of dioxins that are persistent organic pollutants that are one of the most toxic human-released pollutants.
The used process water from a pulp mill contains a lot of organic material such as lignin and other organic material from the trees, including chlorinated organic material. The presence of these organic substances results in high biological oxygen demand (BOD) and dissolved organic carbon (DOC).
Other chemicals that are released into the air and water from most paper mills include carbon monoxide, ammonia, nitrogen oxide, mercury, nitrates, methanol, benzene, volatile organic compounds and chloroform.
Nitrogen dioxide(NO) sulfur dioxide (SO) and carbon dioxide (CO) are emitted during paper manufacturing. All of them cause acid rain and CO is a major greenhouse gas that causes climate change. These toxic gases contribute to air pollution.
Waste water discharged for a pulp and paper mills contain solids, nutrients and dissolved organic matter which when present in high levels pollute water. Nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus can cause or aggravate eutrophication of fresh water bodies such as lakes and rivers. Organic matter dissolved in fresh water changes ecological characteristics and may lead to death of all higher living organisms. Waste water may also be polluted with organochlorine compounds. Some of these are naturally occurring in the wood, but chlorine bleaching of the pulp produces far larger amounts of toxins to be released.
The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has found that recycling paper cause 35% less water pollution and 74% less air pollution than making virgin paper. Pulp mills can be sources of both air and water pollution, especially if they produce bleached pulp.
* I had no idea the paper industry polluted the world so much. It's so shocking to me but makes perfect sense. I don't see why that when all this info is available to us that companies and normal people still don't use/produce recycled paper products.
Deforestation for the Paper Industry
In the past four decades, the use of paper has risen by 400%. Deforestation has become a major problem, both in developing and developed areas.
Roughly, 26% of solid waste dumped in dumping sites is discarded paper and paperboard. Besides, pulp and paper mills also contribute to water, land and air pollution. The industry also uses more water to produce a volume of products that other industries use less water to produce. It has also been identified that de-inking of papers during recycling is a source of chemical emissions.
Deforestation is the clearing of vast areas of trees, largely as a result of human activities.
But why?
Clearing land for agriculture so we can plant Oil Palms (to produce palm oil), Soybeans (to produce food for ourselves, and to feed livestock with various soy products), and other crops. Creating space for cattle ranches in response to the increasing global demand for beef. Expanding urban areas, build new transport routes and housing developments
And, of course, providing the paper industry with wood pulp to turn into paper and cardboard products, our focus today.
Some of these items are steadily becoming outdated in favour of digitalisation, at least in some parts of the world. As we move into the thick of the 21st century many of us have trained ourselves to stop before printing out emails (seriously people!). But it’s still hard to imagine our lives without certain paper products. And the truth is about 14% of deforestation is done to satisfy our huge appetite for paper goods. This amounts to the destruction of around 4.1 million hectares of forest each year in the name of our paper obsession – an area the size of the Netherlands every 365 days.
* Holy shit this is bad.
History of Paper Making
- TIMELINE (paper we recognise today)
Paper was invented in ancient china some 2200 years ago, but was popularized by inventor Cai Lun.
Paper is a thin material produced from natural fibers, pressed together into solid structure after they were loosened in a hot water. This recipe was established more than 2000 years ago in Ancient China.
The largest possible paper sizes were created rarely, and were used as writing or painting scrolls for Chinese royalty and nobility, and later on Japanese nobility where paper was truly accepted in every area of their culture (most famously, as a building material of their houses that had parts of walls made from strong paper).
By 8th century, recipe of paper production arrived into the hands of Arabs, who quickly created their networks of paper mills all across their territories – from western border of China to the Northwestern Africa.
Spain and Sicily were the first countries that started using paper produced by Muslim paper mills in 11th century, and slowly as decades went paper mills started springing up all across Europe.
Paper became widely available only after paper machines became widespread across Europe and North America during 19th century. - bit late??
Different Types of Paper
- parchment
- papyrus
- cotton paper
- sugar paper
- rice paper
- wax paper
- sand paper
- washi
- xuan paper
Articles
* funny, talks about paper being made into bombs??
* talks about the Gutenburg press - revolutionary printing method - knew about this from 1st year thanks Nigel
Paper Sizes
I enjoy B5
but I also have some A1 prints at home which are great
Paper Mill Layouts
These are really great as you can see how the process moves through each room to make the paper.