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Re: Source of wood for paper products?
Author: Forester
Date: 01-11-2015 - 20:22
There is always a residual clean chip product produced when making dimensional lumber or plywood. This material is the main source of fiber for the pulp mills in the PNW. There's also rotten, defective, tops of trees too small for the production of solid wood products that is generated when harvesting. If you are thinning young timber to improve the health of the stand there is lots of this type of product that goes straight to a chipper and is turned into clean chips for pulp, paper or MDF. Chipping yards are scattered across Oregon and some load rail cars. Yards in White City, Grants Pass and near Sweethome all load chip cars.
California had pulp and paper mills at one time that ran on the materials listed above. Today they are all gone. What is generated now has to shipped by rail or truck to Oregon or Washington pulp and paper mills and MDF plants, or is burned for electrical generation. Sierra Pacific loads ocean going barges in Samoa for the trip up the coast.
Kimberly Clark (the people who brought us Kleenex) has a pulp mill in Anderson on the SP. I believe there were two pulp mills out by Samoa and LP had a pulp mill in Antioch, Ca. At this point they are all shut down and some are physically gone.
The paper mills in Oregon and Washington make lots of Kraft linerboard and medium for boxes. There are a few that still make newsprint, but that market keeps shrinking. Several make tissue products like toilet paper, Kleenex, napkins and paper towels. I know of at least one that makes white copier paper. Different products require different types of fiber to produce. Kraft mills love conifer (Douglas Fir, Hemlock, White Fir, Lodgepole Pine, Sugar Pine and sme mills take Ponderosa Pine) chips, because the fiber length is long making it strong for boxes. Newsprint mills like non resinous conifer like Hemlock and White Fir due to the way they process. Tissue mills and copier paper mills like hardwoods because the fibers are short and make a smooth product. Hardwoods like Red Alder also bleach to an ice bright white the customer likes. So not all wood hips are the same, and most mills specialize in product types.
I hope that helps answer your question.
Matt
California had pulp and paper mills at one time that ran on the materials listed above. Today they are all gone. What is generated now has to shipped by rail or truck to Oregon or Washington pulp and paper mills and MDF plants, or is burned for electrical generation. Sierra Pacific loads ocean going barges in Samoa for the trip up the coast.
Kimberly Clark (the people who brought us Kleenex) has a pulp mill in Anderson on the SP. I believe there were two pulp mills out by Samoa and LP had a pulp mill in Antioch, Ca. At this point they are all shut down and some are physically gone.
The paper mills in Oregon and Washington make lots of Kraft linerboard and medium for boxes. There are a few that still make newsprint, but that market keeps shrinking. Several make tissue products like toilet paper, Kleenex, napkins and paper towels. I know of at least one that makes white copier paper. Different products require different types of fiber to produce. Kraft mills love conifer (Douglas Fir, Hemlock, White Fir, Lodgepole Pine, Sugar Pine and sme mills take Ponderosa Pine) chips, because the fiber length is long making it strong for boxes. Newsprint mills like non resinous conifer like Hemlock and White Fir due to the way they process. Tissue mills and copier paper mills like hardwoods because the fibers are short and make a smooth product. Hardwoods like Red Alder also bleach to an ice bright white the customer likes. So not all wood hips are the same, and most mills specialize in product types.
I hope that helps answer your question.
Matt
