The market
The paper industry plays a dominant role in the global economy with a global annual turnover greater than $ 500 billion, producing more than 300 million tonnes of products. American industry represents approximately a third, its European counterpart is estimated at around a fifth. The industry is counting on forest crops with harvesting rotations between 7 years and 100 years. Investments in new facilities reach more than a billion dollars with machines running paper at 100 km/h and a production capacity of 500,000 tonnes per year, thanks to economies of scale. European industry employs 245,000 people directly, for around a million people worldwide. European industry obtains the best recycling results. 42 % of all new paper comes from used content. In the United States, trends are improving with 119 factories counting only on recovery paper. It should be noted that the amount of paper delivered on the American market increased from 105 million tonnes in 1999 to 79 million tonnes a decade later. However, only 36 % of the fiber used to make new paper products in the United States is recycled paper. On the other hand, 63.4 % of all consumption paper was recycled in 2009. However, paper, cardboard and packaging represents 35 % of all solid municipal waste. Fortunately, the amount of paper being in landfill has decreased by 30 % in the past 20 years. The raw materials (paste and fibers) represent a third of the average cost of manufacturing paper, while energy represents just over 35 %. 90 % of all the paper is made from transformed wood. India strongly depends on the bamboo, which generates per hectare and per year up to four times more fibers than a genetically modified pine or a rapidly growing eucalyptus. Recycling a ton of newspapers saves a ton of trees, while recycling quality copier paper saves more than two tonnes of wood. Paper recycling could save up to 70 % energy. However, as paperwork produce a large part of their energy by burning bark, roots and lignin, an increased amount of recycling implies a lower amount of renewable energy which must be produced elsewhere. In addition, as a larger number of recycled paper plants are located near urban centers, energy costs tend to be higher.
Innovation
The pasta and papers industry is looking for a reduced contribution of chemicals. The dramatic impact of dioxin, a by-product which cannot be broken down by natural systems, and its accumulation over the decades have forced the industry to seek alternative whitening techniques, dominated by hydrogen peroxide. Then, the use of sodium sulfate, known as the Kraft process which made paper much stronger, invented more than a century ago, is proposed to be replaced by an enzymatic process. It was Professor Steven CHU, winner of the Nobel Prize, who became energy secretary in the administration of President Obama, who originally discovered it. This process is inspired by the way termites transform wood into their intestines. A group of Malaysian researchers based at the University of Sarawak discovered how to produce a family of enzymes, cultivated in palm waste and rice balls, to eliminate ink from recycled paper without using chemicals. Janis Gravitis, expert in wood chemistry, who has made his entire career at the National Latvian Institute of Wood Chemistry, based in Riga, studied trees and fibers for decades. As a physico-chemist, he studied wood behavior using pressure and temperature. He quickly realized that the wood processing industries only target cellulose, which represents around 50 % of the wood. The rest, lignin (30 % conifers and approximately 20 % hardwood), hemicelluloses and lipids, is traditionally cremated as a chemical cocktail. It has designed a treatment system which - without use of chemicals - only uses the pressure and temperature of saturated water vapor, allowing the wood to be separated into four different fractions. The known technique of experts under the name of "vapor explosion" makes it possible to recover each component individually: pure lignin without adhesives, biochemical products of the phenols or clean combustibles, hemicelluloses as a raw material for edible sugars and Biochemical products, lipids such as oil and biochemical products, cellulose to produce paper, bioethanol, nanofibers for new composites, packaging. Janis and his team then manufactured their own test equipment, separating all the ingredients using a minimum of energy and a fraction of the water normally necessary. The results were remarkable. Paper fibers represent only a minor fraction of total biomass, compared to sugar cane and bamboo, prolific cellulose production factories, long -term competitiveness of paper for paper depends on the generation of multiple income with all the resources available. If we could separate the four main components using a closed loop water cycle, a new business model would emerge. This model based on innovations above all based on the laws of physics, pursuing economies of scale generating multiple cash flows, applies three of the characteristics of the blue economy.
The first cash flow
Latvian scientists dedicated to wood chemistry had little or no contact with the outside world until the end of the Cold War with the fall of the Wall in 1989. The Royal Academy of Sciences of Sweden considered The Latvian research group as exceptional, with a solid academic depth, with the ability to innovate in this unique area of wood chemistry. At the end of the Cold War, Janis and his colleagues had already created wood transformation facilities where fibrous biomass could be shaped and formed, which gave it resistance and durability without having to use epoxids or phenol binders -formaldehyde, as is the case with multi-density fibers or plywood panels. The team using the Furfural extraction techniques, a useful biochemical product in the production of synthetic polymers, then treated the residue after this extraction by vapor explosion. This integration of technologies results in the use of almost 100 % of wood as a raw material.
The opportunity
As indicated previously for algae (Case 21), the "Core Trade Heart - Core Trade Heart" approach loses sight of the opportunity to generate additional cash flows, using available resources. Just as algae can produce food, fuel and fine chemicals, wood should not be reduced to cellulose alone, all residues to be cremated. The experience of Janis Gravitis and his team, who continue their research, demonstrates that a tree can generate multiple cash flows, provided that treatment technology goes from chemical "combustion" of all non -cellulosic materials to A separation technique that allows you to recover each. This is called bioraffinery. In a world where we must urgently improve the effectiveness of our resources, the commercial extraction of only 40 to 50 % should evolve to generate at least three to four times more income, create jobs and reduce the carbon footprint industry. The paper and paper pulp will claim that it counts on "waste" as fuel. As Janis suggests, the only clean fuel component is lignin, which, in its pure form extracted by pressure and temperature only, is in fact too precious to burn or not burn at all. This is a new competitive framework in which new actors will have the opportunity to enter markets traditionally dominated by a small number. It's time to change this impression.
