I don't mean to be a butthead here but... Umbra - were you really in diapers 15 years ago?  Estimating generously, that would mean you're 17 years old now.  I do hope I'm taking broad based eco-lifestyle advice from someone a tad older than 17.  Props to all the green teens out there but still.

[I for one would have been a little older than age 17 about 15 years ago - and I would have wanted to quote eco paper policy chapter-and-verse to any employer.  Whether they would have listened is another story.  I was the mid--to-late-90s "eco warrior" riding my bike to work at a >county< job for years - to the building that used its employee shower as a storage closet - enduring disgusted looks and rolled eyes of inconvenienced supervisors... and NOW King County is all about employee health and trip reduction.  But, anyway...]  

I, too, can't get past the diapers 15 years ago. Please tell us that either a) that was a "new math" lapse and really it was more like 25 years ago or that b) you skipped grades 1-4 and have a degree already and are precociously smart and savvy beyond your years... Maybe there is some other option c) that I haven't imagined.
Now on to the content. Thanks for the well written guide. Any paper procurement policy should include directions for minimizing use in the first place. Some low-hanging fruits are using a print preview to eliminate pages with one or two lines (common on email printous) and printing double-sided. If there is a central printer, you might consider designating a 'scratch' paper tray where you load used paper with the clean side ready for printing. This can be used for printouts destined for markups and non-critical purposes. It's easy enough to select the paper tray from a print dialog.

Stay away from STI "certified" products. STI is an industry-sponsored organisation which has, at least as far as I know, not set up any reliably independent certification process.

Sorry to be a little off topic, but my wife just received another catalog from Patagonia. A real piece of art. And FSC! But why do it? What is its environmental footprint? How much material, water and energy would be saved with email-logs only? I find their catalog highly hypocritical. I thought the new electronic age would virtually eliminate paper but I still see many clinging on to old customs and the belief that their work merits a hard copy.
 

^^^Thanks for the correction. SFI, not STI. I think, that as energy costs continue to rise, these companies will begin to realise that their current business model--as stated above--will not work. Recycling and reuse consume much less energy than direct from pulp production. We'll see which choices they make. Go overseas to cheaper energy, or stay at home and go efficient.

Umbra, I agree with you that it's a very good thing that we can have this discussion at this point in the marketplace.  It says a lot about the consumers and the companies that are making these products available.  

I'm going to comment on a few of the above topics and also make some interesting information available.

 Trees will not be "saved" by eliminating print.  In North America, trees are primarily cut down for wood first (highest value).  It would be more accurate to say "Don't build that house - save a tree."  Paper mills are mostly the recipient of saw mill residuals (chips), tree tops that aren't used for dimensional lumber, and forest thinnings.  There are trees cut down for paper, but it's not the 1:1 correlation that some would have you believe.  
 Recycled paper comes from trees.  It doesn't magically appear and represent a tree not cut down.  It represents a sheet of paper not in a landfill (which is still a good thing). If you take a step back and think about it - the "energy savings" by using recycled paper is a myth.  The recycled paper was already turned from a tree to pulp (primary transformation - which uses the largest part of the total energy required to make paper) - but recycled paper made it's way back into the cycle instead of ending up in a landfill.  Whether the paper is recycled or virgin, it still had to be turned from a tree to pulp first.  Part of the "energy savings" of the much heralded "Paper Calculator" compares the energy required to turn trees into pulp then to paper (primary transormation) versus making pulp into paper (not primary transformation).  This is like comparing apples to donuts.  
 While on the subject of the Paper Calculator - there is another reason it's a great marketing tool, but a bad representation of reality and science.  The "GHG/CO2 equivalent" comparison of virgin versus recycled is flawed.  One of paper's biggest contributors to GHG emissions is at the end of it's life, in the landfill.  As with most anything, it emits methane in a landfill.  The papercalculator doesn't attribute landfill methane/GHG emissions to recycled paper.  What that means is it makes the assumption that ALL RECYCLED PAPER is reclaimed, and recycled again - and even more dangerous, it assumes that all virgin paper ends up in a landfill.  Now, I think it's pretty safe to say that nobody recycles (or doesn't recycle) their paper based on the recycled content of the paper.  Recycled paper wouldn't exist without a fresh supply of virgin fiber into the cycle.  We're all part of the same cycle - it's not an "either/or." Let's end this ridiculous argument.
 To "bailsout"- that I guess is hoping for the electronic age to finally elimate the need for paper:  Paper manufacturing in the US requires roughly 75 billion kwH/year (we're fourth behind Chemical, Primary Metal, and Food manufacturing).  Guess where US based servers and data centers would come in - if they were actually manufacturers?  Sixth.  59 billion kwH/year.  Paper is manufactured largely with about 50% renewable energy (hydro and biomass largely). More renewable energy is used in the kraft process (fine paper- think copy paper) than in groundwood (think newsprint)- so the renewable energy component for copy is in the 70-90% range, depending on the mill.  Data centers and server farms can't claim this - they rely on the grid for their energy, which in this country is largely coal.  The number for data centers and servers is expected to grow quite rapidly over the next 10 years.  The paper industry number, sadly, is not.

Paper is a product that is grown with solar power, made with much renewable energy, is recyclable, biodegradeable, and a large contributor to manufacturing jobs in North America.  Forest products "sequester" their carbon until they decompose, and if the forests are managed properly (a very important part) their existence is largely "carbon neutral" over time.  Can the same be said about an electronic book?  Or even a web page for that matter?  

Certainly we can all do a better job, and nobody I know is in favor of wrecking the environment so they can print an email - but I am disappointed when loose "science" is thrown around and absorbed and regurgitated as fact.

Wow, Lewis, thanks for the insights. I love hearing the other side of the story, especially in a forum like this.

what about other certifications? if SFI is too pro-industry, there should be another certification option i think. a monopoly is never a good thing, especially in an industry where standards differ widely based on their location.

a quick search on certification bodies show that the largest certification body for sustainable forest management is actually PEFC (Program for Endorsement of Forest Certification) by far compared to FSC. There are also articles that discusses the benefits of PEFC vs. FSC, and to me both certification seems valid.

i hope the industry will have more options for environment certifications, this should encourage more companies to sought after a better standard in environment performance.