What the Data Says About Paper, Mail, and the Environment — and Why It Matters to Your Operation

Submitted: Two Sides North America September 9, 2026

This article was originally featured in the Mailing Systems Technology July-August 2026 Edition

If your organization sends transactional mail, direct mail, or printed communications at any volume, you have a stake in how the public perceives the environmental footprint of paper—and right now, that perception is out of step with reality. 

Two Sides North America (TSNA) is part of the global Two Sides network, a non-profit with more than 600 member companies spanning the graphic communications and paper-based packaging value chain. Its mission is to correct environmental misconceptions about paper through data, peer-reviewed research, and direct engagement with the companies spreading misleading claims. A cornerstone of that work is the Trend Tracker, a biennial consumer survey commissioned by TSNA and conducted by research firm Toluna, which polls more than 12,000 consumers worldwide to document public perception in hard numbers. 

The findings are directly relevant to anyone managing print and mail operations, vendor relationships, or sustainability reporting in banking, insurance, government, or the mailing services industry. Environmental myths about paper are not just a PR problem for paper mills. They are influencing whether your customers opt out of paper statements, whether your procurement team demands unnecessary certifications, and whether your organization’s own “go paperless” messaging is creating a liability it hasn’t examined. 

What the Public Believes About Paper Mail

The 2025 Trend Tracker Survey findings put consumer misperception in sharp relief. Thirty-eight percent of U.S. consumers think paper and paper-based packaging are bad for the environment. More than half—55%—believe U.S. forests are shrinking. Around one-third believe paper manufacturing uses excessive water (36%) or that paper is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions (34%). Only 15% correctly identified that more than 60% of paper and paper-based packaging is recycled in the United States. 

For mailing operations professionals, these numbers have a direct operational implication. When a bank customer sees “go paperless to help the environment” on their monthly statement, they are responding to a message shaped by years of accumulated misperception. The opt-out rate on paper communications is not purely a preference signal, it is partly a response to environmental messaging that the data does not support. 

Myth #1: Paper Production Causes Deforestation 

The claim that making paper destroys forests is the foundational myth driving most anti-paper sentiment. It appears regularly in customer communications, sustainability reports, and procurement guidelines and it is not supported by the evidence. 

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization defines deforestation as the permanent conversion of forestland to non-forest use. Sustainable harvesting, where forests remain forests and trees regenerate, does not qualify. The primary drivers of actual global deforestation are agricultural expansion, urban development, and resource extraction. 

U.S. net forest area grew by approximately 10 million acres between 2000 and 2025. Annual harvesting disturbs less than 2% of U.S. forestland—less than the 3% affected each year by insects, disease, and wildfire. More than 11 million family forest owners manage the majority of U.S. private forestland, and sustained commercial demand for paper is one of the primary economic forces keeping those acres forested rather than sold for development. 

Myth #2: Papermaking Wastes Water

More than a third of consumers believe paper manufacturing uses excessive water, a claim that can appear in vendor questionnaires, RFP sustainability sections, and ESG audits. According to the National Council for Air and Stream Improvement (NCASI), process water in a modern paper mill is recycled ten or more times. Nearly 90% is cleaned to meet strict environmental standards and returned to its source. Approximately 1% remains in the finished product. 

This is documented, federally referenced process data. For print and mail service providers responding to client sustainability inquiries, it is the kind of specific, sourced information that belongs in your standard talking points.  

Myth #3: Paper Ends Up in Landfills 

Consumer awareness of paper recycling performance is strikingly low. Only 15% of survey respondents believe more than 60% of paper gets recycled in the U.S. The actual rate, per the EPA and the American Forest & Paper Association, is 60–64% for paper and paper-based packaging broadly, and 69–74% for corrugated boxes. By comparison, plastics are recycled at 13%, glass at 31%, and metals at 34%. 

Paper leads every other common material in the U.S. municipal waste stream. For mail service providers, printers, and their clients in financial services and government, this is directly relevant to any sustainability disclosure or customer communication that touches on the environmental profile of paper-based correspondence. 

Myth #4: Sustainable Paper Must Be 100% Recycled 

“100% recycled content” has become a procurement shorthand for environmental responsibility. The science of paper recycling complicates that assumption in ways that matter for sourcing decisions. 

Paper fibers degrade with each recycling cycle. After five to seven passes through collection, cleaning, and re-manufacturing, fibers weaken to the point where they can no longer bond into new paper and must be replaced with fresh fiber. Without that continuous input, recycled paper production would eventually cease. Fresh and recycled fiber are structurally interdependent, not competing sustainability strategies. 

For managers writing procurement policy or responding to ESG frameworks, this is a meaningful distinction. A mandate for 100% recycled content, without accounting for fiber lifecycle, misrepresents how the supply chain actually functions. 

Myth #5: Digital Communication Is Always the Greener Alternative

This is the myth with the most direct commercial impact on the mailing industry, and the one most in need of a fact-based rebuttal. 

“Go paperless—save the trees” has been a standard line in bank statements, utility bills, insurance correspondence, and government communications for well over a decade. Two Sides North America’s research identifies it as one of the most consequential examples of greenwashing affecting the print and mail sector. A 2022 TSNA greenwashing study found that 65% of consumers who had seen such claims said those messages influenced them to switch away from paper communications. 

The environmental footprint of digital infrastructure is substantial and growing. According to the International Energy Agency, electricity consumption from data centers, AI systems, and cryptocurrency could double by 2026, equivalent to Japan’s entire annual power consumption, largely fossil-fuel-derived. E-waste generation has outpaced formal recycling by nearly five to one since 2010. Globally, only 22% of electronic waste is properly collected and processed. 

The environmental standard applied to a printed statement should be applied equally to the server infrastructure and energy usage, device manufacturing, and e-waste chain behind its digital alternative. Electronic communications are ubiquitous and necessary, but they also come at an environmental cost that should be considered. 

What Two Sides Is Doing and Why It Matters to This Industry 

Two Sides North America pursues misleading environmental claims about paper directly and systematically, on behalf of the entire industry. To date, nearly 220 leading North American companies—more than 1,300 globally—have removed or revised misleading anti-paper claims, removing billions of individual messages from circulation. Two Sides estimates its anti-greenwashing campaign has preserved more than $300 million in annual North American paper, print, and mailing revenue. 

That work is not something any individual print provider, mail service bureau, financial institution, or agency can replicate on its own. Two Sides North America operates as the industry’s research and advocacy infrastructure and the findings feed directly into the conversations that mailing operations professionals are already having with their clients, compliance teams, and customers. 

The sustainability case for paper and mail is well-documented. The data is there. The challenge, as always, is making sure the right people have access to it. 

The summary Trend Tracker report is available at twosidesna.org/trend-tracker-2025. The full 16-page report, with findings segmented by region, generation, and communication type for sustainability reporting, is exclusive for members of Two Sides North America.  

Share this story