Did you know that paper was invented in China around 105 A.D. by T'sai Lung, a scribe in the emperor's court? Since then, the world has made great use of this material especially for newspaper.

*If every American recycled just one-tenth of their newspapers, we would save about 25,000,000 trees a year, a single run of the Sunday New York Times would save 75,000 trees.

*During World War II when raw materials were scarce, 33% of all paper was recycled. After the war, this number decreased sharply.

*If you had a 15-year-old tree and made it into paper grocery bags, you'd get about 700 of them. A supermarket could use all of them in under an hour! This means in one year, one supermarket goes through 60,500,000 paper bags! Imagine how many supermarkets there are in the U.S.!!!

*The average American uses seven trees a year in paper, wood, and other products made from trees. This amounts to about 2,000,000,000 trees per year!

*The amount of wood and paper we throw away each year is enough to heat 50,000,000 homes for 20 years.

*Americans use 85,000,000 tons of paper a year; about 680 pounds per person.

Each ton (2000 pounds) of recycled paper can save 17 trees, 380 gallons of oil, three cubic yards of landfill space, 4000 kilowatts of energy, and 7000 gallons of water. This represents a 64% energy savings, a 58% water savings, and 60 pounds less of air pollution! Those trees could absorb a total of 250 pounds of carbon dioxide from the air each year.


Recycled Paper is Made Into:

Writing tablets Photocopy paper Letterhead paper Newspaper Bags Gift wrap Paper towels and toilet paper.