Is it more expensive to make recycled paper, or regular fresh paper?

Question

anyone know? maybe some numbers?

Answer 1

It all depends.

The biggest variable is the cost of the fiber slurry. Once you have the fiber in a liquid form the process would be identical and so would the cost.

If you have to pay for the wood pulp (like from fresh trees) and you were to get the recyclable paper for free, recycled paper would be substantially cheaper. In the real world, the recycled fiber slurry has a cost, sorting, transportation, prepping. If all those are less than the cost of new woods, recycled paper is cheaper.

Most of the time mills that make recycled paper, locate where the supply, labor and transport do make it less expensive than "new" paper.

Answer 2

No actually it can be a lot cheaper. For a start the energy levels is a lot less than with raw virgin paper. and you already have a large quantity of surplus used stock. Put this together with the argument that recycling paper, you are in effect saving trees hense saving ourselves the answer is an unequivable yes.
curtesy of south wales resource recyclers

Answer 3

No trees are saved by recycling paper. Pulp wood is a crop, it is planted, grown and harvested as a crop. As such the trees that are growing now will eventually be harvested. If demand for pulp wood declines, new trees will not be planted when the current crop is harvested. Recycling paper to save trees makes about as much sense as recycling bread to save wheat.

Answer 4

According to a Penn & Teller show on Showtime I once saw(whose title I'm not sure I can post here), that explores commonly held myths about commonly held beliefs, most commonly recycled items actually use more energy to recycle than to use the original raw product.

Answer 5

Use Hemp, it pollutes 5 times as less than tree paper.

Answer 6

Yes it can be. I understand it costs over three hundred dollars to recycle one single roll of Quilted Northern toilet Tissue.