Some typical calculations

• 1 ton of uncoated virgin (non-recycled) printing and office paper uses 24 trees
• 1 ton of 100% virgin (non-recycled) newsprint uses 12 trees
• A "pallet" of copier paper (20-lb. sheet weight, or 20#) contains 40 cartons and weighs 1 ton. Therefore,
• 1 carton (10 reams) of 100% virgin copier paper uses .6 trees
• 1 tree makes 16.67 reams of copy paper or 8,333.3 sheets
• 1 ream (500 sheets) uses 6% of a tree (and those add up quickly!)
• 1 ton of coated, higher-end virgin magazine paper (used for magazines like National Geographic and many others) uses a little more than 15 trees (15.36)
• 1 ton of coated, lower-end virgin magazine paper (used for newsmagazines and most catalogs) uses nearly 8 trees (7.68)

How do you calculate how many trees are saved by using recycled paper?

1. Multiply the number of trees needed to make a ton of the kind of paper you're talking about (groundwood or freesheet), then
2. Multiply by the percent recycled content in the paper.

For example,

• 1 ton (40 cartons) of 30% postconsumer content copier paper saves 7.2 trees

   

• 1 ton of 50% postconsumer content copier paper saves 12 trees.