Alternative Solutions to Landfilling Paper Mill Packaging Waste, 1992 Finishing and Converting Conference Proceedings

The selection of packaging materials by the paper mills’ finishing department will determine the productivity of the wrapping operation as well as the delivered quality of the paper product. New technology has provided converters with improved roll packaging materials which enhance the quality and salability of paper, while reducing in-house waste associated with the roll packaging operation. Traditionally these materials, once used, have been disposed of by landfilling. Alternatives to landfilling must be developed and implemented, not only for economic reasons, but as an obligation to today’s environmentally-conscious global society.

This paper will examine options available to paper mills’ customers today that allow used packaging materials to bypass the landflll and be reprocessed into economically viable products. Actual case studies will be presented that describe how used roll packaging materials are 1) repulped into paperboard; 2) recycled into water-resistant multi-ply paperboard; and 3) reprocessed into co-generation fuel pellets.