Tree-free paper? It’s possible with BE books!

It’s unbelievable but true that 786 million trees are felled each year to cope with the world’s rising demand for paper products, and the processing that has to be done uses a staggering 98kg of resources for 1kg of paper.  And we know how many student exercise books are gone through after pages and pages of homework and doodles!  So, some clever research has been done to find an alternative, sustainable paper source, and after much tiring research books made from sugar canes are now being produced. The materials, known as “Bagasse” or simply “BE” are made with crushed sugar cane stalks, and are a waste product from the sugar making process.  So not only does this save land  from being deforested,  but there is less need for wood based paper and less wastage from the sugar making process.  It also takes much less energy to produce bagasse paper than wood-based paper.

Surely there must be something wrong, but we can’t think of a thing. Don’t think the quality will suffer either! The sheets are 80gsm, and require less bleaching than conventional paper too. They look and feel just like “normal” paper, but with the knowledge that the environmental impact is  much lower. And, from the folks at The Consortium think it’s such a great idea that they’re selling them at exactly the same price as the standard exercise books.  We even think that soon they will replace them completely!

For a press release go here. Your kids may be writing on the same material as you put in your tea, but we don’t recommend this as a sugar substitute.  Remember this stuff usually gets thrown away! And if you’re a teacher, switching to BE books is easy.  We’re sure you’ll find the books so sweet you’ll never turn back.  (groan!)

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