3 ms·

What's long term for you? Isn't 200 years pretty good?

• lmilcin 5y ago
  How much of the paper that is being produced today do you think will survive 200 years? Let's be realistic about it. If paper/wood was meant to provide any dent in atmospheric CO2 we would have to be drowning in it. Remember, it is not enough to produce wood. You have to take care that it doesn't burn or rot.
  • BenjiWiebe 5y ago
    It rots and some of it's carbon stays in the soil, increasing the mass of the soil.
• SuoDuanDao 5y ago
  I don't think the average lifecycle of a paper product is anything close to 200 years. Even for books that's pushing it, when you consider how much more toilet or printing paper we use and discard... And bleached paper generally uses enough toxins in its supply chain that it can't be easily composted. Therefore when the fibres are too broken down to be recycled again, it generally has to be disposed of in an anaerobic environment, which produces methane as a byproduct. Now of course, while methane is a powerful greenhouse gas it stays in the atmosphere for a much shorter time than CO2, and it can be captured for energy generation. Even so, while solid wood objects are probably quite good for carbon sequestration, I don't think paper will be unless a few key aspects of it change.