Recycled Paper Facts

Today, paper is the country’s most recycled product; in fact, more paper is diverted from landfills for recycling than all other materials combined.
• Last year, 45% of all the paper Americans used was recovered,
a record 45 million tons.
• More paper is now recovered in the U.S. than is sent to landfills.
• Each American on average now recovers 336 pounds of paper for recycling—a 44% increase over 1990.
• Just over a third of all paper and paperboard recovered in the world is recovered in the U.S.
• Every day, enough paper is recovered in the U.S. to fill a train of boxcars
15 miles long.
• Since 1988, U.S. paper recovery has grown more than four times faster than the overall growth in U.S. paper and paperboard consumption.
• During this decade alone, U.S. papermakers will have invested an estimated $10 billion in new recycling capacity.
• Use of recovered paper at domestic mills during the 1990s has been growing more than twice as fast as the use of total fiber.
• Recovered paper now provides more than 37% of the raw material fiber used at U.S. mills, up from 25% in 1988.