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The pulp and paper industry comprises companies that use
wood
Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin th ...
as raw material and produce
pulp
Pulp may refer to:
* Pulp (fruit), the inner flesh of fruit
Engineering
* Dissolving pulp, highly purified cellulose used in fibre and film manufacture
* Pulp (paper), the fibrous material used to make paper
* Molded pulp, a packaging material
...
,
paper
Paper is a thin sheet material produced by mechanically or chemically processing cellulose fibres derived from wood, rags, grasses or other vegetable sources in water, draining the water through fine mesh leaving the fibre evenly distributed ...
,
paperboard
Paperboard is a thick paper-based material. While there is no rigid differentiation between paper and paperboard, paperboard is generally thicker (usually over 0.30 mm, 0.012 in, or 12 Inch#equivalences, points) than paper and has certain ...
and other cellulose-based products.
Manufacturing process
The pulp is fed to a paper machine where it is formed as a paper web and the water is removed from it by pressing and drying.
Pressing the sheet removes the water by force. Once the water is forced from the sheet, a special kind of felt, which is not to be confused with the traditional one, is used to collect the water. Whereas, when making paper by hand, a blotter sheet is used instead.
Drying involves using air or heat to remove water from the paper sheets. In the earliest days of paper making, this was done by hanging the sheets like laundry. In more modern times, various forms of heated drying mechanisms are used. On the paper machine, the most common is the steam heated can dryer.
History of the paper industry
Papermaking
Papermaking is the manufacture of paper and cardboard, which are used widely for printing, writing, and packaging, among many other purposes. Today almost all paper is made using industrial machinery, while handmade paper survives as a speciali ...
as a
craft
A craft or trade is a pastime or an occupation that requires particular skills and knowledge of skilled work. In a historical sense, particularly the Middle Ages and earlier, the term is usually applied to people occupied in small scale prod ...
is ancient, and for centuries it used various fibers, mainly
grass
Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns an ...
es (cereal
straw
Straw is an agricultural byproduct consisting of the dry stalks of cereal plants after the grain and chaff have been removed. It makes up about half of the yield of cereal crops such as barley, oats, rice, rye and wheat. It has a number ...
s and others), or
rag
Rag, rags, RAG or The Rag may refer to:
Common uses
* Rag, a piece of old cloth
* Rags, tattered clothes
* Rag (newspaper), a publication engaging in tabloid journalism
* Rag paper, or cotton paper
Arts and entertainment Film
* ''Rags'' (1915 ...
s from old clothing made from them, in various preindustrial times and places. The
commercial
Commercial may refer to:
* a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television)
** Radio advertisement
** Television advertisement
* (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...
planting of domesticated mulberry trees to make pulp for papermaking is attested as early as the 6th century.
Due to advances in printing technology, the Chinese paper industry continued to grow under the
Song dynasty
The Song dynasty (; ; 960–1279) was an imperial dynasty of China that began in 960 and lasted until 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song following his usurpation of the throne of the Later Zhou. The Song conquered the rest ...
to meet the rising demand for printed books. Demand for paper was also stimulated by the Song government, which needed a large supply of paper for printing
paper money
A banknote—also called a bill (North American English), paper money, or simply a note—is a type of negotiable promissory note, made by a bank or other licensed authority, payable to the bearer on demand.
Banknotes were originally issued ...
and exchange certificates.
An example of an enterprising
paper mill
A paper mill is a factory devoted to making paper from vegetable fibres such as wood pulp, old rags, and other ingredients. Prior to the invention and adoption of the Fourdrinier machine and other types of paper machine that use an endless belt, ...
during the late phase of the preindustrial era is the mill by
William Rittenhouse and sons at what is now preserved as
Historic RittenhouseTown
Historic RittenhouseTown, sometimes referred to as Rittenhouse Historic District, encompasses the remains of an early industrial community which was the site of the first paper mill in British North America. The mill was built in 1690 by William ...
in Pennsylvania.
The first
mechanised paper machine was installed at
Frogmore Paper Mill
Frogmore Paper Mill is a working paper mill situated in Apsley, Hertfordshire, near Hemel Hempstead. The mill is on an island in the River Gade, which forms part of the Grand Union Canal. It is the oldest mechanical paper mill in the world.
Hist ...
,
Apsley, Hertfordshire
Apsley was a 19th-century mill village in the county of Hertfordshire, England. It is a historic industrial site situated in a valley of the Chiltern Hills. It is positioned below the confluence of two permanent rivers, the Gade and Bulbour ...
in 1803, followed by another in 1804. The site operates currently as a museum.
During the 19th and 20th centuries, the
paper chemical
Paper chemicals designate a group of chemicals that are used for paper manufacturing, or modify the properties of paper. These chemicals can be used to alter the paper in many ways, including changing its color and brightness, or by increasing i ...
technologies for making the
pulp
Pulp may refer to:
* Pulp (fruit), the inner flesh of fruit
Engineering
* Dissolving pulp, highly purified cellulose used in fibre and film manufacture
* Pulp (paper), the fibrous material used to make paper
* Molded pulp, a packaging material
...
from
wood
Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin th ...
rather than grasses underwent some major
industrial-era upgrades, as first the
soda pulping
Soda pulping is a chemical process for making wood pulp with sodium hydroxide as the cooking chemical. In the ''Soda-AQ'' process, anthraquinone (AQ) may be used as a pulping additive to decrease the carbohydrate degradation. The soda process give ...
process and then the
Kraft process
The kraft process (also known as kraft pulping or sulfate process) is a process for conversion of wood into wood pulp, which consists of almost pure cellulose fibres, the main component of paper. The kraft process involves treatment of wood chip ...
helped reduce the
unit cost
The unit cost is the price incurred by a company
A company, abbreviated as co., is a legal entity representing an association of people, whether natural, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a com ...
of paper manufacture. This made paper newly abundant, and along with continual advancements in
printing press
A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a printing, print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in wh ...
technologies, as well as in
transport
Transport (in British English), or transportation (in American English), is the intentional movement of humans, animals, and goods from one location to another. Modes of transport include air, land (rail and road), water, cable, pipeline, an ...
technologies (for distribution), during these same centuries, led to greatly increased sales and
circulation of newspapers, other periodicals, and books of every kind.
Environmental effects
The pulp and paper industry has been criticized by environmental groups like the
Natural Resources Defense Council
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is a United States-based 501(c)(3) non-profit international environmental advocacy group, with its headquarters in New York City and offices in Washington D.C., San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Bo ...
for unsustainable
deforestation
Deforestation or forest clearance is the removal of a forest or stand of trees from land that is then converted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land to farms, ranches, or urban use. The most concentrated d ...
and
clearcutting
Clearcutting, clearfelling or clearcut logging is a forestry/ logging practice in which most or all trees in an area are uniformly cut down. Along with shelterwood and seed tree harvests, it is used by foresters to create certain types of fore ...
of
old-growth forest. The industry trend is to expand globally to countries like
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...
,
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
and
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
with low wages and low environmental oversight. According to
Greenpeace
Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning network, founded in Canada in 1971 by Irving Stowe and Dorothy Stowe, immigrant environmental activists from the United States. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth t ...
, farmers in
Central America
Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...
illegally rip up vast tracts of native forest for cattle and
soybean
The soybean, soy bean, or soya bean (''Glycine max'') is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean, which has numerous uses.
Traditional unfermented food uses of soybeans include soy milk, from which tofu an ...
production without any consequences, and companies who buy timber from private land owners contribute to massive
deforestation of the Amazon Rainforest
The Amazon rainforest is the largest rainforest in the world, covering an area of 3,000,000 km2 (2,316,612.95 square miles). It represents over half of the planet's rainforests and comprises the largest and most biodiverse tract of tropica ...
. On the other hand, the situation is quite different where forest growth has been on the increase for a number of years. It is estimated for instance that since 1990 forests have grown in Europe by 17 million hectares, which has been supported through the practice of sustainable forest management by the industry. In Sweden, for every tree that is felled, two are planted.
The pulp and paper industry consumes a significant amount of water and energy and produces wastewater with a high concentration of
chemical oxygen demand
In environmental chemistry, the chemical oxygen demand (COD) is an indicative measure of the amount of oxygen that can be consumed by reactions in a measured solution. It is commonly expressed in mass of oxygen consumed over volume of solution whic ...
(COD), among other contaminants. Recent studies underline coagulation as an appropriate pre-treatment of pulp and paper industrial wastewater and as a cost-effective solution for the removal of COD and the reduction of pressures on the aquatic environment.
Current production volumes and sales
The industry is dominated by
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...
n (
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
and
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
),
northern Europe
The northern region of Europe has several definitions. A restrictive definition may describe Northern Europe as being roughly north of the southern coast of the Baltic Sea, which is about 54th parallel north, 54°N, or may be based on other g ...
an (
Finland
Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
,
Sweden
Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
, and
North-West Russia) and
East Asia
East Asia is the eastern region of Asia, which is defined in both geographical and ethno-cultural terms. The modern states of East Asia include China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan. China, North Korea, South Korea and ...
n countries (such as East Siberian Russia,
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
,
Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...
, and
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
).
Australasia
Australasia is a region that comprises Australia, New Zealand and some neighbouring islands in the Pacific Ocean. The term is used in a number of different contexts, including geopolitically, physiogeographically, philologically, and ecologica ...
and
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
also have significant pulp and paper enterprises. The industry also has a significant presence in a number of European countries including Germany, Portugal, Italy, the Netherlands and Poland. The United States had been the world's leading producer of paper until it was overtaken by China in 2009.
List of main countries by production quantity
According to data from Statista,
China produced 110 million metric tons in 2018 followed by the US with 72 million.
According to statistic data by
RISI, main producing countries of paper and paperboard, not including pulp, in the world are as follows:
List of main company groups by production quantity
The world's main paper and paperboard company groups are as follows. (Some figures are estimates.):
List by net sales
In 2008, the top 10 forest, paper and packaging products companies were, according to a report by
PricewaterhouseCoopers
PricewaterhouseCoopers is an international professional services brand of firms, operating as partnerships under the PwC brand. It is the second-largest professional services network in the world and is considered one of the Big Four accounting ...
:
Manufacturers and suppliers for the industry
Leading manufacturers of
capital equipment
A fixed asset, also known as long-lived assets or property, plant and equipment (PP&E), is a term used in accounting for assets and property that may not easily be converted into cash. Fixed assets are different from current assets, such as cash ...
with over $1 billion in annual revenue for the pulp and paper industry include:
*
Valmet
Valmet Oyj is a Finnish company and a developer and supplier of technologies, automation systems and services for the pulp (paper), pulp, paper and energy industry, energy industries.
Valmet has over 200 years of history as an industrial oper ...
*
Bellmer
*
Andritz
*
Metso
Metso Oyj was a Finnish industrial machinery company focusing on providing technology and services for mining, aggregates, and oil and gas, recycling, pulp and paper and other process industries.
On 30 June 2020, Metso's partial demerger and ...
*
Voith
The Voith Group is a German manufacturer of machines for the pulp and paper industry, technical equipment for hydropower plants and drive and braking systems. The family-owned company, which operates worldwide and has its headquarters in Hei ...
Scan Machineries*
Kadant
Kadant Inc. is a company that was established in 1991 as a partly privately owned subsidiary of Thermo Electron, and partly publicly traded company, and was fully spun out and renamed Kadant in 2001. The company focuses on papermaking, paper re ...
Statiflo
See also
*
American Forest & Paper Association
The American Forest & Paper Association (AF&PA) is the national trade association of the paper and wood products industry.
AF&PA was formed on January 1, 1993, by the merger of the National Forest Product Association and the American Paper Ins ...
*
List of paper mills
This is a list of paper mills sorted by country.
Algeria
* GIPEC SPA, Baba-Ali Mill, Bilda
Argentina
* Papel Prensa, San Pedro Pulp and Paper Mill, San Pedro, Buenos Aires Province
Australia
* ABC Tissue Products, Sydney
* Asaleo Ca ...
*
Converters (industry)
Converting companies are companies that specialize in modifying or combining raw materials such as polyesters, adhesives, silicone, adhesive tapes, foams, plastics, felts, rubbers, liners and metals, as well as other materials, to create new pro ...
*
Pulp and paper industry in Canada The pulp and paper industry in Canada is one of the country's most important and profitable industries.. It is especially concentrated in Ontario and Quebec and plays an important role in many other provinces..
Leading companies
The leading for ...
*
Pulp and paper industry in Europe
The pulp and paper industry in Europe accounts for about a quarter of world production and is a major employer. The leading producing countries are Finland, Sweden and Germany. The industry is a large user of renewable energy and achieved a recy ...
*
Confederation of European Paper Industries
The Confederation of European Paper Industries (CEPI) is the pan-European association representing the forest fibre and paper industry.
Through its 18 national associations, CEPI gathers 495 companies operating more than 900 pulp and paper mills a ...
*
Pulp and paper industry in Japan Japan is the third country in the world in production of paper ( 2011 figures). The leading Japanese company in the field (2015) is Oji Paper, with three other Japanese companies Sumitomo Forestry, Nippon Paper Group, and Unicharm
is a Japane ...
*
Pulp and paper industry in the United States
The United States is one of the biggest paper consumers in the world. Between 1990 and 2002, paper consumption in the United States increased from 84.9 million tons to 97.3 million tons. In 2006, there were approximately 450 paper mills in the Un ...
*
Roll hardness tester A roll hardness tester is a device to measure the roll hardness, hardness profile and hardness variation of paper rolls.
Method
In the preparation phase, the plunger, guide bar and guide disk are pushed forward by the compression spring. At the en ...
*
Wood industry
The wood industry or timber industry (sometimes lumber industry -- when referring mainly to sawed boards) is the industry concerned with forestry, logging, timber trade, and the production of primary forest products and wood products (e.g. furnit ...
*
Forestry industry
The wood industry or timber industry (sometimes lumber industry -- when referring mainly to sawed boards) is the industry concerned with forestry, logging, timber trade, and the production of primary forest products and wood products (e.g. furn ...
*
Environmental impact of paper
The environmental effects of paper are significant, which has led to changes in industry and behaviour at both business and personal levels. With the use of modern technology such as the printing press and the highly mechanized harvesting of woo ...
References
External links
Confederation of European Paper Industries American Forest & Paper Association(AF&PA)
Forest Products Association of Canada(FPAC)
{{Authority control
Lists of countries by economic indicator
Industries (economics)