France-based waste and recycling firm Veolia Propreté has worked in cooperation with French standards organization AFNOR to produce a 144-page guidebook to recovered paper grades as they are produced in Europe.
The hard-cover Illustrated Guidelines for the Various Grades of Paper and Board from Recycling features 67 scrap paper grades as they categorized by the EN 643 “European List of Standard Grades of Recovered Paper and Board.”
Each grade receives a two-page spread that includes one or more photographs of how the grade may typically look, accompanied by the EN 643 description of the grade in four languages: French, English, German and Chinese.
The guidebook entries follow the same order as the EN 643 standards, with bulk or “ordinary” grades at the front of the book, followed by medium grades, high grades, kraft grades and special grades.
Most grades also feature the parallel grade description offered by the United States-based Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) PSI Chapter, which in its specifications includes more than 50 grade definitions for export transactions.
The EN 643 descriptions include suggested maximum contaminant or outthrow levels, as do most of the PSI specifications. These maximum levels, however, are not always identical.
The book is likely to serve as a handy reference to any recycler or trader who may not be thoroughly familiar with all 67 grades, and it may be particularly useful to people new to the industry. The book may also prove useful to government officials and scrap paper generators for whom recovered paper is not a full-time vocation.
In a preface to the book, Veolia Propreté France Recycling Director Marc-Antoine Belthé writes, “The aim of this document is to facilitate relations between the various stakeholders in the recycling chain, thus making it even more efficient.”
Belthé also writes, “Compliance with [EN 643] grades necessarily presupposes easy access to the standard and understanding its content. It is precisely for this purpose that this document has been written.”
Those seeking more information about the book or wishing to order a copy can contact Beate Delkash of Veolia at beate.delkash@veolia.com or +33 6 2446 2132.