Recycling paper in the paperless office

Documents can now be produced, reproduced and refined so effortlessly that the electronic office has actually resulted in an increase in the use of paper — paper that costs offices money to buy and money to dispose of. Of the thousands of tonnes of paper thrown away each year, it has been estimated that 130 000 tonnes could be economically recovered and recycled. Besides recycling there are other measures to be considered — avoiding waste by using each piece of paper fully before discarding it; restricting the number of copies made of a document, — which may be applicable to particular offices. Here we are looking at the two faces of recycling: the salvage of paper to be sold to be reprocessed into ‘recycled’ paper, and the purchase of the recycled paper to use in place of ‘virgin’ paper. Virgin paper is made from trees either chemically pulped, when it is known as ‘wood free’ or mechanically pulped.