THE NEWS PRINT PAPER SITUATION 



137 



third comes from Canada, and the Canadian supplies are 

 by no means inexhaustible. 



As the figures in Table IV show, there are ample sup- 

 plies of pulpwood for a great many years in Alaska and 

 the Northwest, but, unfortunately, only about 5 per cent 

 of the mills are located there. From a national stand- 

 point, of course, making the paper in the United States 

 would be better than importing it from Canada; but, as 

 long as the publishers can obtain Canadian paper more 

 cheaply than they can get paper from the West, they will 

 naturally buy from Canada. There are, however, several 

 factors that will gradually bring Western paper into 

 competition with the Eastern product : 



(1) There are great quantities of wood available in 

 the West at stumpage prices of 25 cents to $1.50 per cord, 



A GRINDER SUCH AS THIS WILL MAKE 6 TONS OF GROUND 

 PULP A DAY, REQUIRING ABOUT 6 CORDS OF WOOD. A 200- 

 TON PLANT REQUIRES 33 OF THESE GRINDERS AND A LARGE 

 WATER POWER. 



as compared with $2.50 to $5 per cord in the Northeast. 



(2) Much of this wood is on the National Forests and 

 is, theref re, available without the carrying charges that 

 must be figured against large investments in land. 



(3) The yield per acre of the forests is much greater 

 than that of the Eastern Canadian forests, and, conse- 

 quently, smaller areas are sufficient to produce a given 

 amount of pulpwood at a reduced cost of production. 

 The average value of Canadian wood in 1915 was $6.71 

 a cord, as compared with $8.76, the value of pulpwood 

 in the Eastern United States in 1916. During the war 

 the price paid by some of the Eastern mills was as high 

 as $22 per cord. One of the mills on the Columbia River 

 paid in 1916 an average of $4.82 for white fir, $5.32 for 

 hemlock and $4.36 for Sitka spruce. 



(4) There are large water powers available in the 

 West. ' 



Partly offsetting these advantages are the higher cost 

 of wages in the West and the' high freight charges to 

 the points of consumption, as most of the publishing is 

 done in the East. Until recently Western paper com- 

 peted with the Eastern product only as far east as 



Denver and Salt Lake ; but, with the present high prices 

 of paper a small amount of Western paper has found its 

 way into the Eastern market. Western lumber is already 

 competing with Eastern lumber, with the result that 

 much good spruce which should be cut into lumber is 

 going into pulp. 



Both of the measures mentioned above, importations 

 from Canada and increased production in the West, are 

 temporary expedients. In the long run, the country must 

 solve the paper problem on the basis of a permanent 

 wood supply. There are two ways of helping to accom- 

 plish this, and they require a constructive national policy : 



(1) The utilization of mill waste for paper making, and 



(2) the regeneration of our forests on a more productive 

 basis. 



Sawdust may be made into pulp, but not economically. 

 On the other hand, mill waste, including slabs and edg- 

 ings, is well adapted for paper making by the sulphite 

 process. At present only about 3 per cent of the wood 

 used for pulp is mill waste, and this is evidently a very 

 small portion of all the slabs and edgings from the 

 spruce, fir and hemlock that is now being made into 

 lumber. For every thousand feet of lumber manufac- 

 tured there is a waste of about one-half cord of slabs at 



A DIGESTER SUCH AS THIS WILL MAKE ABOUT 15 TONS OF 

 SULPHITE PULP AT A COOK, OR 30 TONS A DAY. SIXTY CORDS 

 OF WOOD CHIPS ARE REQUIRED TO MAKE 30 TONS OF 

 CHEMICAL PULP. 



