Volume 1, Number 3
May 1988

Letters

To the Editor:

We recently received a copy of your newsletter from a West Coast customer, which I read with much interest, particularly your list of paper mills which produce acid free papers. I'm not sure how your list was completed, but I wish to inform you of an omission that was made.

Parsons Paper Company (a division of NVF Corp.) is a small Massachusetts paper producer, primarily rag and cotton content papers, which has been operating continuously since 1853. The current mill site, Parsons II as it was known, has been in operations since 1888.

We have been producing various alkaline papers for many years; in fact, of our total production, roughly 90% is made alkaline. Many of these are "converter grades" which go into end products not easily identified except by those industries who consume them directly. However, our commercial grades of bond and writings which include L'Envoi, Old Hamden and Parsons Bonds, Parsons Writing and Cover, are all alkaline, as well as Parsons Linen Ledger, Diploma Parchment and several others.

In addition, we have produced a variety of "Art Papers" for more than two decades which are sold under private label to various distributors, and are for obvious reasons produced alkaline. These include Museum Boards, Print Papers, Illustration and Drawing grades.

I would also like to respond to your comment relative to the need "to stamp out the myth that paper is only good if it is 100% rag." It is true that many good papers are made of woodpulp; however, there are various characteristics desirable in certain grades of paper, which can best, and in some cases only, be achieved by the use of rag.

Lastly, I would like to receive your newsletter on a regular basis

D. John Coutu, General Manager
Parsons Paper Co.
Holyoke, Massachusetts

To the Editor:

On the Editor's Page of the Abbey Newsletter in August, 1987, you noted the lignin in wood- and the composition of newsprint as provided by Smook [Handbook for Pulp & Paper Technologists, Atlanta: TAPPI and Montreal: Canadian Pulp " Paper Association, 1982]. The following composition of wood, as given to students in my Wood Chemistry class, is;

Composition of Temperate Zone Wood

Thus, softwoods have higher lignin and lower cellulose compared to hardwoods, with extractives and hemicelluloses about the same. (Hemicelluloses vary in composition between softwoods and hardwoods, however.) The table shows relations that are generally true. An exception is oak, a hardwood, which has 32% lignin.

Groundwood for newsprint is made from softwoods and so the lignin content is somewhat higher than 23% (AN). Mechanical pulp yields are about 95% (low molecular weight hemicelluloses and water extractives are lost) and so the lignin content of groundwood is about 28.6 +/ 0.95 (or 30%).

Smook is correct in that newsprint historically has been about 75% groundwood and 25% chemical pulp. However, many different furnishes are currently used. The driving force has been the high cost of purchased chemical pulp. Accordingly, paper mills without kraft mills have gone to TMP (see table) or CTMP (both stronger than groundwood) to reduce the amount of purchased pulp. Even those mills that manufacture kraft try to reduce this component because it is more expensive than mechanical pulp.

The furnishes used in five mills making newsprint are shown in the following table.