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Management Side
Week of 16 February 15: You are surrounded

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The email started out like many others I get: "Dr. Thompson... my son has been persuaded to take up pulp and paper science as a career. I do not know anything about this; what do I need to know?" That's a short paraphrase, as it was a long email. In my response, I immediately corrected the "Dr." greeting and went on to wax enthusiastic about our industry, as I usually do.

Perhaps I should have said more or approached the subject something like this....

If you are writing to me while sitting in a modern structure built to today's building codes, you are surrounded by pulp and paper products. As I often say, they are so ubiquitous they are invisible.

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Let's do an inventory. We'll assume you are sitting in a room roughly 10 feet x 10 feet (3 m x 3 m). If this room is covered with wallboard on four sides and the ceiling, their surface area is 420 square feet. This wallboard likely has facing paper of a basis weight of 26 lbs/1,000 square feet and backing paper of 42 lbs/1,000 square feet. So, you are surrounded by 28.56 pounds of paper, just to start with. By the way, check my math--I am notorious for producing faulty math calculations in this column. Have I ever told you that I think wallboard facing paper is one of the most difficult applications we have in the paper industry? We ask an awfully lot of this paper over a very long period of time.

What else do you have in the room? Five pounds of newsprint, even in these days of newsprint decline? Plus, easily several hundred pounds of books. If you have any manufactured furniture with laminated tops, you have several layers of one of the most expensive grades of paper known.

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A visit to the "loo" is a confrontation with tissue grades of all sorts and sizes. If you change your infant's "nappie" while there, more pulp was used. (I just love the English terminology for these functions). Back at the refrigerator, your ice cream likely has pulp in it. Other processed foodstuffs may contain pulp as well.

Your modern electronics also may contain layers of specialized paper products.

Of course, we haven't even begun to talk about all those overnight delivery boxes that wind up at your front door each week. In our household, these have gone from being an interesting anomaly to a regular occurrence.

Yes, pulp and paper is alive and well and everywhere. We are going to have fun with our quiz this week--you get to offer more items that are within arm's reach that contain pulp and paper.

For safety this week, modern antiseptic conditions in our safety systems would not be possible without pulp and paper. However, that does not mean that we ourselves do not need to exercise diligence.

Be safe and we will talk next week.

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