New Paper Helps Meet Environmental Needs

Large companies and organisations face the same challenge - how to meet environmental targets without jeopardising the look and feel of their printed material, according to M-real.

Large companies and organisations face the same challenge - how to meet environmental targets without jeopardising the look and feel of their printed material, according to M-real.

A new silk coated paper developed by M-real - Era Silk - is claimed to provide a breakthrough by providing the whiteness and performance of a non-recycled paper with an environmental footprint.

Era Silk is also said by the company to be the first recycled coated paper to use only waste collected from UK sources.

It is now available nationwide from paper merchants Antalis and James McNaughton.

A swatch folder is also available, containing plain and printed samples of all the different weights of Era Silk.

It can be obtained from all Antalis and James McNaughton branches nationwide and M-real added that both paper merchants have high environmental credentials and hold chain of custody certification.

David Adams, paper product manager for WRAP (the Waste and Resources Action Programme), welcomed the new product and said: "We are excited to see another recycled content coated paper launched in the UK.

WRAP's advice to business and the wider public sector is to specify coated papers with a minimum of 50 per cent recycled content and Era Silk joins an impressive group of recycled content papers that meet this requirement, whilst matching virgin paper quality and performance.

Demand for recycled content papers is growing rapidly and their purchase provides significant environmental benefits, particularly by reducing the landfilling of office paper waste." The Confederation of Paper Industries (CPI) has also commented on Era Silk.

Kathy Bradley, the deputy director general of the CPI, said: "I believe Era Silk is the first coated recycled paper to use only fibres recovered from communities across the south-east of England, which are then reprocessed at M-real's New Thames RCF (recycled fibre) plant." Era Silk is said to be suitable for brochures, report and accounts, environmental reports, leaflets, catalogues, magazines and other applications.

The company said that the paper's silk finish is attractive to feel and provides excellent readability for text or figures because of its low-glare qualities.

Colour photographs and illustrations are also reproduced to a high standard.

The paper is manufactured from 50 per cent genuine waste pulp, with the balance of pulps from certified forests.

It is available in popular sheet sizes in a range of weights from 100gsm to 350gsm and in reels in weights up to 190gsm.

It is suitable for single colour or multi-colour print and heat-set web offset.

Keith Livermore, the business development manager for M-real UK, provided further information about the waste collected for use in Era Silk: "By recycling genuine waste paper collected mostly from a 100-mile radius of the mill, we minimise road transport distances.

By removing and recycling 180,000 tonnes of waste paper a year for use in Era Silk and our other recycled papers, we are helping reduce the pressure on UK landfill sites.

The market size for recycled coated papers is set to expand rapidly and industry experts expect the recycled market to grow to 10 per cent of the total coated sheet market in four to five years.

The use of recycled coated paper has been hampered predominantly by two factors - the lack of quality genuine recycled fibre and the subsequent products produced.

With Era Silk, we believe M-real has addressed both these issues." Era Silk is made at M-real's Sittingbourne Mill in Kent, utilising recycled fibre manufactured at the company's nearby RCF plant.

The company said that both mills possess environmental credentials in waste treatment, recycling and management systems, certified by ISO 14001 (environmental management system) and EMAS (Eco management and audit scheme).

Both are working towards chain of custody certification.

The mills' combined heat and power plant is recognised as an industry leader and is a full member of the Carbon Trust.

Waste transport distances are kept to a minimum and pulp output is chlorine free.

M-real's New Thames RCF plant is continually looking for new ways to use by-products of the recycling process and innovative projects include bedding for worms at vermidigestion farms, industrial wall panelling boards and pallet top boards for M-real's own products including Era Silk, added the company.

The virgin fibres used in Era Silk all come from certified forests and the pulp mills involved are currently completing chain of custody verification.

M-real can provide details of the origins of all wood used in its papers and it publishes the information as part of its Paper Profiles product information bank.

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