If you really want to make an environmental impact, make sure the paper you use is made from a mill located in the United States where the industry is strictly monitored by the EPA. Pulping processes are required (by law)to be free of elemental chlorine, resulting in emmisions that contain no detectable dioxins, unlike the off-shore grades that are made without a governing body like the EPA. Off-shore grades may be cheap, but are they worth the price we will all eventually pay?

All paper mills in the USA are today on the “brighter shade of green” complying to manufacturing standards in paper making unparalleled by any other country in the world.

By the way…all USA manufactured paper pulp is archival resulting in acid free paper.

I’ve heard scientist friends tell me that burying paper or putting it into a landfill where it turns to mulch is called carbon sequestration. Cutting down trees to clear space for new trees, and burying (not burning) the harvested trees (or making furniture or floors) is the best way to reverse global warming.

I’ve heard others claim that the energy used to recycle exhausts more carbon than is used to make virgin paper.

I’ve heard others say that recycling paper is important, and we should bury the trees because there is energy concentrated in the finished paper product.

I’ve heard a lot of people *saying* things, with contradictory conclusions, but they are for the most part opinions without any science.

I don’t know what to tell you, other than it might not be all bad to put paper into landfills.

Punk trees in Fla are eradicated because there are exotics and ruining the natural environment.

A VERY fine quality paper can be made from it. It might take an artist or craftsperson to make paper from punk, but the result is a paper finer than the best Japanese. Try it–

Could it be made comercially? In what quantities?

I understand that paper is not endlessly recyclable. To make paper, there needs to be long cellulose fibers. Each time a sheet of paper is recycled, those fibers get shorter. After a few trips through the mill, the fibers get too short to be usable.

Last point: Hemp has an interesting history in the US. At one point the government actively encouraged farmers to grow it. (”Ditch Weed” still grows wild in the Midwest.) Dupont and Hearst teamed up to sully the crop. The story would make for a good Mental Floss article.

Switch the locations of the recycle bin and the trash can. Make then walk further to throw paper away.

Make the laziness work for you!

Seriously though, I use a lot of paper in my classroom and I struggle to get the kids to walk the extra few steps across the room to recycle their old papers instead of throwing them away.