Hurricane Sandy & Your Paper Stock

As Hurricane Sandy leaves a trail of flooding in her wake, many businesses will soon be returning to their stores to assess the damage caused by the monster storm. Among damages you may find that some (or all) of you paper stock may have gotten water logged or may now be warped. This can happen to most paper; from copy paper to premium paper to label sheets.

Water logged paper will probably not be salvageable, however, you may be able to save paper that has warped from humidity.

What Causes Paper Warping?

It’s all about the humidity. When the humidity that the paper is stored in is drastically increased above the recommended storage humidity, the edges of the paper absorb the moisture in the air. This causes the edges to start becoming wavy and warped.

How Can I Prevent Warping?

Optimal conditions for paper storage is between 60-80®F. The recommended relative humidity for the storage room is about 40-60%. Some paper needs special temperatures. If you’re worried about the humidity and temperature settings for your paper, contact your supplier.

You shouldn’t store your paper on the floor. At the very least get the boxes up on pallets to keep them from absorbing moisture from the floor. It’s best to store your paper in boxes on shelves. That way if flooding does occur, your paper is up off the ground and (hopefully) high enough to avoid getting water logged.

How Can I Save Warped Paper?

The first two things you’ll need to do in order to try getting your paper back to normal is to buy some dehumidifiers and get temperature right (and, of course, get all the flood water out of your store). Once you have the dehumidifiers cranked and the temperature back on its way to normal, it’s a waiting game. Usually leaving the paper in stable conditions over night will at the very least make an improvement if not completely fix the paper.

Water logged paper (paper that is completely soaked) will most likely not be saved by this. This method is for use on paper that is a bit warped from the humidity caused by the flooding.

Sourced From The Birkes on Flickr

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