Nowadays if you buy a newspaper in Paris, it is very likely the paper was transported by water. 20,000 tonnes of  paper reach Paris' newspaper and magazine printers by ship, the waste collected in bales are shipped back by barge to Rouen for recycling. By next year, volumes will develop by 6 to reach 120,000 tonnes with the introduction of a new logistic concept based on 45ft ILUs.

For the past 10 years Syctom, the Paris household waste treatment company, has encouraged sustainable transport solutions for the big waste flows generated by a metropolitan region like Paris, but the contract passed with the paper company UPM Kymmene is truly unique, and a fine example of an innovating solution.

Shipping waste consisting of collected old newspapers and magazines for recycling to Grand-Couronne (Rouen) has already been in operation since 2005 with a 800 tonnes motorbarge equipped with an onboard crane, but now UPM Kymmene will send also the newly manufactured paper rolls (2.5m wide) by ship to Paris where they will again be used to print daily newspapers and magazines. This makes a perfect round trip for a new liner service. So, if you buy a newspaper nowadays in Paris, it is very likely the paper was transported by water. 

This liner service will use a dedicated 1,800 tons motorbarge operated by MARFRET(fluvio-feeder) which takes on board thirty ‘45 ft palletwide’ containers, thirty one way and thirty back, and will operate twice a week. The 45ft containers with the paper rolls, stacked 2 high, have a curtain side to facilitate loading and unloading. The operation avoids all-in-all around 4,200 truck movements a year and this volume is set to increase.

The company is still looking to develop its traffic by using a ro-ro vessel able to carry 60 trucks on each trip from and to Paris, which could lead to another 3,000 trucks less on the road. This new organisation should be operational in 2 to 3 years, which leaves sufficient time for the shipyard to conceive and build this innovating ro-ro vessel.