Concerning Pulp and Paper’s Nicotine
Jim,
I've used an outhouse. It's overrated. Current methods are hugely better. 'Course there are some locations overseas where a toilet is a hole in the floor. And the military still teaches the finer points of latrine trench digging. Field alternatives to toilet paper include large leaves. Watch out for the three pointy shinny ones.
Gene Canavan
Alabama USA
---
Jim,
Great commentary and I liked your phrase "Toilet paper is truly our nicotine." However, finding the nicotine in communications grades may not be so easy. As my late father used to say "It's easier to teach people how to use tissue than it is to read".
Bob Hurter
Ontario Canada
---
Jim,
I got an unusual ‘kick’ out of your nicotine comparison for the paper industry. You are right on target. The fact of the matter is that the tissue guys (from competitive pressure, I’ll bet) have developed exceptionally good tissue paper products
* Soft
* Strong
* Absorbent
* Fluffy
* Relatively cheap (getting corn cobs recovered, packaged and delivered to restrooms across our land would not be cheap)
And from the looks of the products on the shelves, the innovation continues. As far as I know, no one has proposed any sort of “product substitution” in this area, short of bidet’s and some commodes that spray clean and blow dry (yep, Kohler is marketing such a device!) And it seems that the producers continue to be profitable and viable. I suspect they’ve learned to ‘manage’ the supply/demand balance to some degree.
Packaging has a somewhat similar position. There are more ‘substitution’ alternatives, but as long as the suppliers keep the supply/demand situation in balance and keep their profitability expectations within reason. Packaging substitutions will be slow and on an item-by-item basis.
P&W grades are another story; there are simply too many alternatives to paper. John Mumford at UCC, after hearing a paper market prognosticator talk about the exponential market growth rate that the industrialization of the Far East (particularly China) would bring, commented quietly, “My fear is that these people will skip over the age of paper communications and telephone poles and go directly to a paper-less/cell phone society.” It appears that he was more nearly correct than the prognosticator. However in their industrialization process, they decided to make lots of paper that they aren’t using in their homeland, thereby upsetting our on-shore applecart. (I wonder if they are building tissue machines.) Although I’ve never been much of a visionary, I still can’t see the “nicotine” for P&W grades.
So maybe the real question is, “Is the best use of a tree a fiber source for P&W grades of paper?” If the P&W manufacturers can’t find some ‘nicotine’ in their marketplace, the answer may well be “NO”
I hope you are well and enjoying every day our God grants us.
Ed Turner
Texas USA
---
Concerning Fuels and Greenhouse Gases
Jim,
If you are open to suggestions concerning future topics, I would suggest that your readers would like you to weigh in on the latest fad in pulp mill survival strategies: Biorefining. I have been following the proposals and initiatives in the technical press, have heard researchers from several institutions talk about the potentials of chemical generation, and have followed the popular press concerning bio-ethanol with corn and wood-based feed stocks. I hate to admit it, but I have even been drawn into the fray by engineering folks that are trying to cost out a woodyard for a wood-based ethanol system. (Turning actual standing trees into ethanol through fermentation?) Hope springs eternal.
My own opinion is worth little, but it seems to me that this is much ado about nothing. I like to think that if a pulp mill would leverage its infrastructure and waste streams and become successful in generating a great deal of some commodity chemical like methanol or methane (say, through gasification), the result would be to depress the open-market selling price of that material rendering the economics of the entire venture unviable. We like to think big, but the reality of the market may be that bigger is not better. Small amounts of some specialty chemical may be much better (more profitable!) than large amounts of a commodity chemical. To press my point, I offer the story below:
In the press here in Seattle over the weekend was a report about the opening of a 1 million gallon per year bio-ethanol plant in Boardman Oregon, built at a cost of $100 million and under-written by Bill Gates to the tune of $84 million. The economics of the plant were based on a selling price of ethanol at $3 per gallon. The article stated that several of these large-sized plants have started up in the Midwest in the past 12 months (using corn), with the effect of depressing the market price of ethanol from $3 per gallon, to $1.50. This particular plant is getting its corn from the Midwest by rail and selling the wet stillage in the PNW (saving the costs of drying and transporting it), but that $1.50 per gallon was less than the operating cost of the plant. The plan was to sell the ethanol as a gasoline additive and I guess that is still what they want to do. Perhaps we will see the price of gas go down? Ha!
With the potential of a technological solution for marginally profitable pulp mills being offered in the way of this biorefining technology, a person should be reasonably skeptical and ask some hard questions. You like to ask hard questions, don’t you? Maybe your column is a good place to ask them.
By the way, my new Prius gets a steady 48 miles per gallon. I drive it when I am not on my bicycle.
I will write to you again soon about the Kyoto Protocol and carbon issues. I have been having a great time researching this interesting and important issue.
Desmond Smith
Washington USA
---
Desmond:
You are probably suggesting a column a little more serious than this week's. I'll give it some thought. It will not happen before I attend the US-India Renewable Energy Summit (see "Jim's upcoming travels", below).
Jim
---
Concerning Who flew the Atlantic first?
What about Alcock and Brown, who flew a Vickers Vimy from Newfoundland (part of North America) to Ireland (part of Europe) in 1919???
Bert Joss
Florida USA
---
Good question, Bert. I remember reading an article about them years ago in the Reader’s Digest.
Jim
---
Concerning Strange Characters
Why in all your articles do the apostrophe's and quotes (") print out with three or four strange symbols replacing the ' or the "? Just curious if it is your setup or mine.
Bill LaVallee
California USA
---
Bill:
This is a problem the software minions have not been able to solve. It only seems to happen on some types of reading software. I do everything they tell me to do to avoid it, but it continues. Sorry.
Jim
---
Concerning Tax Collection
Jim,
Nice to see our friend Joe Broz won a prize !
In response to the riddle for the week of 15-Oct-07 go to http://www.dpca.org/BreedEd/masterminds.html
to learn that Karl Friedrich Louis Doberman bred a ‘harsh’ breed of dog to protect him during his rounds as a tax collector…
Arrived here in Parchment MI in August, accepted an operations position with GP/Koch after I was released from Active Duty in mid-May earlier this year.
Trust all is well with you sir,
Best regards,
Mike
Michael J Sherbak II, P.E.
Michigan USA
---
Mike:
Thank you for your service to our country.
Jim
----
Riddle answer: Doberman Pinscher dog
Jeanne Balog
Illinois USA
###
Have a comment? Send your email to jthompson@cellulosecommunity.net. Please indicate if we can use your name if we publish your letter.
|
