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The market for specialty papers in North and South America
Article by John Nelson, Smithers
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The specialty papers While offering attractive revenue, the specialty papers market in the Americas market in the Americas will face a series of new chalwill face a series of lenges and opportunities over the ne t five years. new challenges and hese are profiled and e amined in a brand ne study from opportunities over the Smithers – The Future of Specialty Papers in North and South ne t five years. America to 2025. In this exclusive content for PaperFIRST, Smithers examines ho this mar et ill change over the ne t five years. hile paper mar ets such as ne sprint, maga ines, and office papers have been in decline for many years due to electronic alternatives, most specialty papers serve a function that an electronic product cannot replace. ey factors driving change in the orth and outh American specialty papers mar et re ect society s increasing interest in developing options that are lo er cost, more efficient, and more environmentally friendly. As larger, faster paper machines making commodity grades are shut down due to declining markets, some are transferring to producing high-volume specialty paper grades, such as release liner and e ible pac aging. As an incentive to their customers, they are using innovative technologies to offer lighter, stronger paper, or higher uality finishes.
echnology allo ing better connectivity and using ndustry . tools for more precise process control is particularly valuable for faster machines. pecialty paper customers often have very specific re uirements for such properties as basis eight, caliper, smoothness, gloss or et strength, and grade changes bet een customers, hich can lead to a lot of transition paper that does not meet specifications, can be minimised ith automation, resulting in more efficient production.
eaching customers through advertising and relying on customer loyalty to sell products is becoming more difficult in a orld here customers have more information at their fingertips. ac aging that stands out, especially in food stores, is one ay to attract shoppers attention to ne products and to convince them that a product offers added value over alternatives. his can create demand for lu ury pac aging grades, hich typically use higher basis eights, have higher brightness, and more coatings.
he emergence of e boo readers ate into sales of printed boo s, but e boo sales seem to have stabili ed at about of all boo s. he use of specialty papers for covers and binding of boo s is declining at a slightly lo er rate than in previous years. e business opportunities in the food industry, including take-out, ready-to-eat meals from the deli section of grocery stores, and delivery services such as ber ats, all provide convenience to last minute shoppers and have created opportunities in the specialty paper mar et, especially for e ible raps, bags, and light eight disposable pac aging, such as paper cups.
Concern for the environment has driven a demand for more sustainable materials. he ideal materials are not only bio based, but are also reusable, recyclable and compostable. aper scores ell in all these categories, although it is not uite as suitable as plastic for re use pac aging formats, but in all other categories it is a better environmental choice. here is thus an opportunity to s itch some materials from plastic to specialty papers. ncluded in this trend is a desire to move, here feasible, from multilayer pac aging made of paper, plastic and aluminium, to paper based pac aging ith ater based barrier coatings.
overnments are helping to drive better recycling and composting infrastructure hile putting up barriers to the use of less environmentally desirable materials. hey are using a combination of strategies that include setting up e pert advisory boards creating sustainability targets passing legislation to ban materials, such as single use plastics and implementing ta es or fines. A term that is increasingly being used to promote better sustainability is the idea of a circular economy, in hich resources are ept in use for as long as possible, ma imum value is e tracted from them while in use, and these are recovered and used for regenerated products and materials at the end of each service life. pecialty papers fit ell into this model, as paper is one of the most recycled products on earth.
Innovation is necessary for survival in the specialty paper market, but many specialty paper manufacturers are very small and cannot develop ideas independently that require large investments and lengthy development or . any of the ne est ideas are coming from third parties, such as chemical suppliers or research institutions, or from open innovation concepts, such as competitions. One example of the former is nanocellulose, a technology that has been developed over the last years mostly by consortium research. An e ample of open innovation is the e t en onsortium, hich aims to develop fully recyclable ta e out cups, founded by c onald s and tarbuc s. icrocellulose and nanocellulose technology has been available for many years, but only at a small scale until the late s. he technology is no available to ma e micro nanocellulose products on a commercial scale, and in the period many products ill benefit from their use. he current applications of micro nanocellulose in specialty papers generally fall into four categories: lighter basis eights lo er cost furnish opacity improvement and surface barrier properties.
Some chemicals traditionally used as additives in making specialty papers are no out of favour due to health and or environmental concerns. hese are being replaced ith more sustainable and less controversial substitutes. o e amples are the replacement of bisphenol A B A or other phenol type additives in thermal paper for receipts, and the replacement of per and poly uoroal yl substances A to impart greaseproof properties to papers for food raps and other products.
ater based barrier coatings for specialty paper products are being developed to replace less recyclable alternatives, such as poly laminated papers or e truded polyethylene layers. Bio based a products, hich are bio sourced compostable products, can replace paraffin a for ater resistant products. unctional coatings can also be applied to paper to impart such properties as antimicrobial actiThe supply chain for specialty papers vity. ndustry . has brought together computing power, wireless networks, internet, cloud storage and other ne tools. ombined ith state of the art papermaking equipment, papermakers can now precisely control paper quality and make faster grade changes, allowing more uniform, higher quality products at a lo er cost. hile these ne technologies are being implemented in , there are still some unmet goals that could become closer to being met by . aper is finding more ays to replace plastic, for e ample in a ne ood based hermocell material developed by in inland. he plastics industry is Source: Smithers developing bio based and compostable polymers, North and South American specialty paper hich may contend ith paper based solutions if sales by country, 2015–25 (‘000 tonnes) the cost can be matched. he goal of an easily recyclable or compostable pac aging ith barrier properties for water, grease, oxygen, and water vapour ithout using plastic or foil is currently difficult to meet, but some of these goals are being met.
he uture of pecialty apers in orth and outh America to delivers e pert ualitative and quantitative analysis of the shifting market proposition for specialty paper in these t o orld regions. This includes a comprehensive data set charting historic, current and future demand for grades of specialty papers, in each region and major national mar ets.
Notes: 1 = US values have been divided by 10; e = estimate, p = predicted, f = forecast Source: Smithers
