European Paper Recycling Conference: Recovered Fibre Momentum

Two representatives from the paper manufacturing industry took the microphone at the 2009 European Paper Recycling Conference to affirm their support for scrap paper as a critical raw material for the industry.

Teresa Presas, executive director of the Confederation of European Paper Industries (CEPI), Brussels, said recovered fibre helps Europe’s paper industry “use raw materials and energy in an efficient way—and it’s sustainable.”

CEPI, which represents trade groups in 18 nations and some 800 member companies, is among the organizations that worked to ensure that recovered fibre was labeled as a “resource-efficient raw material” rather than a waste within the European Union’s new Waste Directive, said Presas.

The growth of economies in emerging market nations will put “unprecedented pressures on fibre resources,” predicted Presas.

Presas also referred to a 2009 study that demonstrated how the ongoing and increased use of recovered fibre could help the global paper industry produce more paper in 2020 than in 2008 while using less energy and water.

She also predicted that Europe, as “a hub of recycling knowledge” could export its “know-how to developing economies in neighboring areas of Europe and in other regions of the world.”

Rickard Arnqvist, who works for forest products and paper company Stora Enso, gave an overview of that company’s operations and the wider industry’s outlook as a consumer of recovered fibre.

Globally, the trend toward recovered fibre use has been upward since 1990. According to a study cited by Arnqvist, the world’s paper industry has gone from using 28 percent recovered paper as feedstock in 1990 to 47 percent by 2000 and an anticipated 60 percent by 2020.

Since the material has grown in importance to the industry, papermakers are paying more attention to the recycling process, says Arnqvist. “A secured cost-competitive fibre sourcing [strategy] will be of very high importance in steering investments,” he commented.

Arnqvist also noted, though, that some papermakers, including Stora Enso, are beginning to experiment with new natural fibre strategies because of an anticipated global tightness in the recovered paper market.

Arnqvist showed one example of a Stora Enso eucalyptus plantation near one of its mills in Brazil. Such plantation pulp sources could help Stora bridge an anticipated fibre supply gap, he commented.

The 2009 European Paper Recycling Conference was held Nov. 16-17 at the Hotel Bloom in Brussels.