Please consider the environment before printing this story

The advent of e-mail, though a seemingly paperless mode of communication, is responsible for the consumption of more than a few trees. In response, you may have noticed a new trend in your inbox: the tagline “Please consider the environment before printing this email” (or some variety thereof).

Though the origins of the message aren’t clear, the practice has caught on from the blogosphere to the boardroom. Despite the ubiquity of computers, BlackBerries and other digital toys, however, Canadians are using twice as much paper as they did two decades ago, according to Statistics Canada.

Per capita consumption of paper for printing and writing from the years 1983 to 2003 rose a shocking 93.6% to 91.4 kilograms — about 20 000 pages per person.

A few more scary statistics (from Markets Initiative):

• 65% of all logging in boreal forests and 40% of logging in temperate rainforests of Canada is for paper
• 50% of the volume of wood logged in Canada comes from British Columbia’s temperate rainforests and interior forests; the other half comes primarily from boreal forests across the country
• Canada consumes a considerable proportion of its forest products, while exporting close to 70% of its lumber, 46% of its pulp, 87% of newsprint and more than 66% of its paper
• Catalogs, copy paper, lumber, newspapers, magazines and even toilet paper are made from Canada’s old-growth forests
• Printing and writing papers are one of the largest end-uses of paper products, including copy, book, junk mail, magazine and catalog paper. Many are made from endangered boreal fibres.

So what harm can the message do? Those who have added the tagline to their email signatures say they were less likely to waste paper after first seeing it in a colleague’s email. Hey, we do it. You should too.