Pulp and Paper 3079 



25-1 SIZE AND SCOPE OF THE INDUSTRY 



Most of the pine-site hardwood used as industrial raw material during the 21st 

 Century will likely be fabricated into solid wood products such as pallets, 

 crossties, and furniture; panel products such as structural flakeboard and fiber- 

 board; energy related products such as solid, liquid, or gaseous fuels; and into 

 pulp and paper. Use for pulp and paper will probably dominate (fig. 2-2). 



The pulp and paper industry originated with simple manual equipment de- 

 signed to form single paper sheets; such small-scale operations are still produc- 

 ing specialty papers (Brandis 1978; Paper 1978). In some countries, such as 

 India, small paper mills producing less than 30 tons per day are commercially 

 viable (Western 1979). In the southern United States, however, both pulp mills 

 and paper mills are very large; these pulp mills have average output of more than 

 800 tons per day and paper mills average perhaps 600 tons per day, airdry basis. 



The size and scope of the southern pulp and paper industry, and prospects for 

 its use of hardwood pulpwood, can be assessed by studying national demand for 

 pulp and paper. 



NATIONAL DEMAND^ 



Pulpwood consumption in domestic mills has increased thirteenfold since 

 1920, rising from 6. 1 million cords to 78.6 million cords in 1978. As a result of 

 such growth, about half of the cubic volume of timber harvested from domestic 

 forests is used for pulpwood. Annual consumption of paper and paperboard (not 

 including insulating board and fiberboard which are discussed in chapter 23) 

 increased from about 8 million tons in 1920 to about 67 million tons in 1978. Per 

 capita annual consumption of paper and paperboard rose about 420 percent 

 between 1920 and 1978, increasing from 145 pounds to about 611 pounds in 

 1978. (For trend charts of the industry see figs. 29-5ABC and 29-lOAB, as well 

 as figs. 25-1 through 25-8.) 



Since 1920, average consumption of pulpwood to produce a ton of pulp has 

 not changed greatly, averaging about 1.6 cords/ton of ovendry pulp; values of 

 1.5 and 1.4 are projected for the year 2000 and 2030, respectively. These 

 reduced wood requirements per ton of pulp are expected because of technologi- 

 cal advances in high-yield pulping and because of increased use of hardwoods, 

 which are denser than the softwoods traditionally used. 



'Condensed from U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service (1980). 



