Laurence - Paper cups

Mass of one paper cup = 10.1g [New Scientist]

Number of paper cups required to make 5×10⁵g of waste = 49505

Number and quantity of tea required to generate this many cups, assuming 365.25 days per year and 250ml per cup: 135.5 cups of tea, or 33.9 litres per day.

I think that's probably a fatal dose of tea, even allowing for the slightly diuretic effects of caffeine making it harder to hyperhydrate. Assuming a more reasonable 6 cups of tea per day, on a working year of (say) 200 days that's 1200 cups of tea in a year, producing 12120 g of waste using paper cups. To make half a tonne, this would take 41 years, by which time my first paper cup will be well on the way to biodegrading and I'll be 70 and hopefully retired. I don't know how long a paper cup would last as a pen holder, but at a guess it would take several centuries to produce half a tonne of paper cup waste from storing pens. Hmm.