Paper mills … on the prairies?

A stunning new development in paper production could make exactly such a lucrative new industry possible. Canopy, a Canadian environmental not-for-profit organization, is championing Second Harvest paper – made out of discarded straw left over from the grain harvest.

“This is an entirely new green resource sector for Canada, just waiting to be developed,” says Nicole Rycroft, Canopy’s founder and executive director. “It’s got green jobs, value-added revenues to farmers, and really strong market support.”

If new paper plants are built, and the potential is fully realized, she predicts hundreds of millions of trees could be saved.   

“We have documented at least enough market demand to keep four mainstream paper mills running around the clock, with paper sales that would amount to in excess of $900 million.”

The idea got a high-profile boost when prominent Canadian author Margaret Atwood announced that a special, autographed edition of her new book – In Other Worlds: SF and the Human Imagination – will be printed on Second Harvest paper.
  
“The Atwood book proves that paper made from straw is not green with pink spots, and it doesn’t feel like rubbing your hand on sandpaper,” Rycroft notes. “It performs just like any other paper. When they ran it at the printers, there were no breakages. And it has half the ecological footprint.”
 
The raw material – straw – is limitless. Most just gets thrown away. The biggest obstacle is infrastructure. The specialized pulping mills and paper plants don’t yet exist.

“This is an incredible opportunity for Canada to develop a new green resource industry,” she says. “We can make excellent quality paper. We have an incredible sustainable economic opportunity for Canada to be a leader here. It’s within our grasp, but we need to put the commercial-scale production facilities in place.”

That will require a huge amount of capital investment. But the payoffs could be significant – both financially and ecologically.

“Sometimes, solutions aren’t really complex. We have straw in abundance in Canada. It’s right here. We can do it within the next 12 months, if we really put our minds to it.”