Virgin Newsprint Harms Environment

To the Editors of The Crimson

The Crimson often asks its readers to recycle their papers when finished. As Recycling Coordinator, I am happy to say that these requests seem to work. Every week, thousands of Crimson issues are among the six tons of newspaper we truck off campus for recycling. However, recovering discarded paper is only half the job of recycling. The other half is buying recycled. Unless consumers express a purchasing preference for products made from recycled paper, backlogs of post-consumer paper will pile up in dealers' yards. Because demand for products made from recycled newspaper hasn't caught up with the supply, Harvard's Facilities Maintenance must pay its waste paper hauler $35 per ton to take newspaper.

The Crimson currently publishes on virgin newsprint. If The Crimson really wants to support recycling, it should buy recycled newsprint stock instead and help provide a market for all the old Crimson issues once readers finish them. Rob Gogan   Recycling Coordinator   Facilities Maintenance Department