Blog 6

Blog 6

            A common topic that I have noticed throughout this course is the recycling of materials, primarily paper products. Discussing and reading about paper products in this class really rang a bell with me. In my seminar class last semester, Materials of Art, I researched handmade paper quite a bit. For my final project, I actually made paper from old newspapers. I think that especially one thing that stuck out to me was when we were talking about the length of fibers, and how it affects what they can be used for. Paper is made from cellulose fibers that are essentially compressed so that they form hydrogen bonds.

            When I made new paper out of old newspapers, I also had to research a lot to figure out the science and chemistry behind it. A good article that I found during my seminar class was from the Turkish Journal of Agriculture & Forestry. The title of the paper is “Crack Propagations and Fatigue Characteristics of Some Handmade Papers.” I think this article helps explain how the chemistry of paper works very well. For example, it explains how the fibers are held together by hydrogen bonds. In the paper that I made from newspapers, I did not have to add any kind of adhesive. I just soaked newspapers in water until they became soft enough that they fell apart and then I put them back together using the same chemistry that had been used to put them together in the first place. I think that this must effect the way in which the fibers are put back together in recycling as well. This means that when paper is recycled, no additional chemicals are necessary for adhering the cellulose fibers.

           

            Although additional chemicals are not necessarily required to recycle paper, they can be very helpful. The properties and potential uses for recycled and handmade paper depend on a number of things, and “the physical properties of the fibers themselves and the bonds formed between them are the 2 factors that most affect paper properties,” (Karademir, Imamoglu, and Cetin, 2003, 115).  I think that this would mean that even if there are already added chemicals in the paper that is being recycled, the fibers themselves and not the added chemicals would be the most important part of determining how difficult the recycling process will be. In addition, this means that it is less important to use additional chemicals in the new paper that is being made, which will result in a decreased need for the manufacturing and producing of the chemicals, saving energy and resources.

            I think that this article also relates a lot to when we were discussing the length of the fibers determining what they can be used for. Something that I learned during my seminar class is that more surface area of touching fibers results in a stronger paper due to an increase in hydrogen bonds. Ergo, the longer the fibers, the more hydrogen bonds each individual fiber will have, and the more additional fibers that it has room to bond with. This relates to how we were discussing high quality paper—such as printer paper, which is stiffer and more brittle—loses value when it is recycled. It is less likely to end up as printer paper again because when the paper is recycled, the fibers are cut up and lose some length, resulting in less hydrogen bonds with less other individual fibers, and therefore, a more flimsy and softer paper. This softer paper is mostly used for things such as paper towels and toilet paper. It is also the reason why those are both compostable, because they can be degraded further more easily and have less value as recyclables.