The yellow pages industry has been expanding dramatically over the past few decades: from $10.3 billion in 1996 to a projected $16.77 billion by 2010. But with this growth and expansion of publishers has come a serious challenge: the impact of green on the yellow world.

Going Green: Environmental Challenges in the Yellow Pages Industry 2009 is an in-depth look at the size of the yellow pages industry, the amount of paper used to produce books, the amount of waste and recycling efforts.

The overview looks at the history of the environmental movement, when and where it started and, more importantly, what is its status now? It also studies the resources available to publishers including the Association of Directory Publishers, the Yellow Pages Association and Product Stewardship Institute, the organization that has been working with the associations and environmental groups and mediating stakeholder dialogues.

Going Green is designed to help publishers, suppliers and environmental groups to understand the challenges facing the industry.

Highlights include:

• Measures taken by industry trade groups and individual publishers to reduce their environmental impact;
• Opt out and opt in measures and their benefits and weaknesses;
• Recycling programs;
• The potential impact on sales;
• A segment by segment look at the industry;
• Profiles of key publishers including incumbent and independent;
• The progress of printers and paper supplies to meet environmental guidelines.