Paper is fast becoming a globally traded commodity imported into every region of the world. One market that has been heavily affected by this global movement is North America. It's estimated that between 25-30% of coaxed free sheet used in North America is imported. Last year a comparative study of North American offset printed papers was presented. This paper serves to follow-up by comparing domestically produced North American to imported European papers. The resulting paper gives a current comparative snapshot between North American and imported European sheet fed offset printing papers from an optical, printing performance and a coating structure standpoint.In summary, it was found that North American and imported European papers were similar. Optically, North American and imported European papers shared similar gloss and roughness properties. North American Papers, glossy brands especially, appeared to be higher in opacity. With respect to brightness, it is more likely that a North American #1 brand will be brighter than an imported European #1 but an imported European #2 brand will be brighter than a North American #2. Overall, grade structure remains hazy as significant overlap in the brightness ranges of available #1 branded and #2 branded papers exists, especially in the imports. In printing performance, North American and imported European papers possess similar ranges of behaviors in wet repellency, formation mottle and stiffness. North American papers appear to show a slower ink setting rate and a reduced backtrap mottle tendency, especially in the glossy papers. Structurally, glossy North American papers have lower overall coat weights (indicating European papers have less fiber content). Hollow plastic pigment was found to be present in coatings to varying degrees among multiple geographies.
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