Quite often, we will be asked a question about the newspaper, its history, how things are going, or the process of publishing the paper. We welcome the questions and want to provide a forum for providing the answers to all our readers.
Our printing facility and the newspaper we produce in Newcastle each week are becoming more unique. If you were to go back 100 years, many smaller newspapers contained all the equipment needed to produce and print their own products. Small print shops also helped support newspapers historically, serving their communities with all types of paper goods. That is not the case today.
Through years of consolidation and closures, we believe the state is left with only four printing facilities for newspapers, while only three of those plants can print color pictures. Nearly all newspapers in the state must now rely on a printer to bring their publication from the digital world to a physical product that you can hold and read.
Our print shop is one of the things that distinguish us from other newspaper publishers. In addition to the weekly printing of The Lincoln County News, we print seven other weekly papers, 20 monthly publications, a biweekly newspaper, and a seasonal newspaper for other publishers. This is in addition to printing books, envelopes, brochures, cards, and other printed products that we handle in house with digital and sheet-fed presses and a full-service bindery.
Before the pandemic, we held more frequent tours with members of the public, including school organizations, Scouts, and other interested groups.
One of the things that always garners attention when we tour the room which houses our newspaper press are the rolls of paper that are stacked high. People ask the normal litany of questions: “How much do they weigh?” “How do you move them?” “Where do they come from?” “How many papers can you get out of a roll?”
The newspaper press is a web press, meaning that it prints on “webs” of paper, a continuous roll that runs through printing units. The webs are then collected in a folder that folds, cuts, and delivers the paper out the end.
The rolls that we use are 42 inches in diameter and primarily 33 inches in width, and weigh about 1,000 pounds apiece. We solely source the newsprint from White Birch Paper, a company headquartered in Connecticut that operates three Canadian mills. We have to order paper a truckload at a time, which is about 45 full rolls.
Most often, the paper which we use comes from the Stadacona Mill in Québec City, Québec. This past December, my wife and I were joined by two friends for a tour of this mill, located on the river in the historic part of the city. Originally built in 1927, the mill produces approximately 250,000 metric tons of paper per year.
We learned about the process of paper making and how the company secures virgin wood products and converts it to the newsprint we use. Then we went for a tour of the impressive facility that houses three giant paper machines, slitting machines, and an automated wrapping facility to protect the paper from the origin point to the end user.
Being on the river and situated in the historic city, the mill is very concerned about pollution. The management team discussed water purity requirements that are monitored in real time both as sensors in the water stream and through tests. They use a few species of fish to make sure that more than one species can live in the effluent that is discharged, and have very tight reporting requirements to the Canadian authorities if they ever fall outside of the tight parameters.
Most of the power used in Québec comes from hydroelectric sources. In addition, the company works with some local plants to use waste heat, heat that would otherwise be sent into the environment, to help produce the steam needed later in the papermaking process.
In addition to environmental considerations, the mill also ensures sustainable methods for sourcing all of the wood used for making pulp. The growing conditions in Canada produce some of the best paper fibers in the world for newsprint, with great growing conditions for spruce and fir.
The mill procures wood chips to begin the paper-making process. We were told 100% of the chips used for the newsprint come from waste streams of other processes, such as the waste from lumber mills. The company also has a process to ensure that all fiber supplies come from forests that are managed for sustainability and comply with forest management principles.
The chips go through a thermo-mechanical pulp-making process, which involves a combination of steam and mechanical force to break the chips into a “slurry” of water and fibers. Giant machines work the chips into a mixture that is mostly water. This mixture is then sent to a process to brighten the paper.
Newsprint is grayer than most other commercial papers. This is because the process of whitening newsprint does not use chlorine or other stronger agents. Hydrogen peroxide is used at this mill, which limits the brightness of paper that can come from the pulp. It also breaks down to water through the brightening process.
A headbox on the paper machine deposits the slurry onto moving mesh in such a way as to align the fibers to maximize strength and usability of the paper. The rest of the machine is designed to remove water while providing the correct texture of the sheet for printing. What starts as almost entirely water ends with a product that has less than 7% water.
The paper machines deposit the paper onto giant rolls, which are designed to be continuously wound. When one master roll reaches the desired diameter, a machine breaks the web and flicks it onto another rotating shaft.
Workers then immediately move the master roll to a slitter machine at the end of the machine, which will slit the master roll into different widths. Cardboard cores of the exact widths for customer orders are used to rewind the paper into a finished size.
These rolls then are transported to a lower level by a conveyor system and an automated system wraps and marks the rolls. Forklifts with clamps arrange the orders, pack them on a truck, and send them out for delivery.
The mill moves over 40 trucks a day from the mill. This year, approximately 11 truckloads will make their way from Québec to Newcastle.
We move the rolls around our facility the same way as at the mill, with a forklift equipped with a large clamp. Newsprint is sold by weight, so there are different lengths to each roll, as the thickness of the sheet is not always consistent. On our press, the cut-off distance is 22.75 inches, which means each copy that comes off the end if cut to this exact length. Our rolls have over 35,000 feet of paper (more than 6.5 miles!), which produce about 20,000 pieces from the press.
This rather long introduction to what we hope becomes a regular column in the paper is meant to get you thinking about questions. While this is was a soft lob question, we won’t shy away from tough ones. We want to be open and transparent about what we do, how we do it, and provide reasons when asked. If you would like to ask a question, we will endeavor to answer it completely, and hopefully more succinctly than in this column.
Please call 563-3171 or email feedback@lcnme.com with any questions, or if you would like to schedule a tour. Similar to letters, please provide a name and town of residence, which will be published with the response.
