Flexo Technology Sustainable progress in packaging
This report from Bobst explores how the company is innovating to bring sustainablity to its products.
he types of packaging are countless, just as their uses to keep all sorts of products safe, people healthy and purchases delivered intact. Everyone is touched by packaging, so its sustainability is really about people. People doing the right thing with the skills, experience, and knowledge they have developed working with packaging, from research and development (R&D) to sales to logistics through to the end consumers, so that the sustainability path is effective while also being kept grounded and rational.
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Consumers have been advocating the necessity of sustainable packaging, and brand owners have been in the front line of fulfilling the pledge to eliminate single use plastics and make packaging recyclable by 2025. However, brand owners and converters cannot afford to compromise on the expected quality and safety of packaged products and must act to maintain the sustainable growth of their operations.
Current innovations in printing and converting machinery for flexible packaging reflect the pivotal role of sustainability in the industry. Equipment manufacturers have been increasingly focused on developing reliable machinery that can maximise the potential of the sustainable progress made with progressive substrates, water-based inks, and fewer resources to deliver impressive results.
Bobst is a single source supplier that can offer all technologies for production of flexible packaging end-to-end. Understanding every stage of the production process by listening
to and learning from the challenges and requirements of its converting customers, also means that the Bobst R&D teams and their competence centres can target for improvement the areas of the packaging printing and conversion processes that matter. Commenting more specifically on CI flexo printing, Sara Alexander, marketing and communications manager, flexible packaging said: “The advances in CI flexo printing over the last 10-15 years have been incredible in terms of the process’s increased quality and efficiency. Our CI presses meet whatever demanding print applications customers ask of them, and we make use of our dedicated competence centres, which include pre-press facilities, to analyse all the elements of the process to maximise its efficiency for our customers.
“By looking at different printing speeds, different drying techniques alongside understanding the substrates themselves and the inks being used, we can contribute considerably to the overall environmental performance and footprint of the product.”
There are several aspects to the way Bobst is leveraging the skills, experience and knowledge of people – from Bobst and the ecosystem of industry partners – to integrate social responsibility at every stage of a product cycle: O Developing substrates and working with consumables with optimized properties with as high barrier as possible from as little material as possible, that can be recycled in the existing collection and recycling streams. This has led
to industrially viable solutions like the AlOx and AluBond processes and the oneBarrier PrimeCycle and FibreCycle
O Continuously testing and updating processes and technical solutions so that the equipment can handle new substrates and consumables at speed without compromising output quality and equipment efficiency. These include Bobst oneECG and water-based printing, the latter achieving 800 m/min production speed on the Master CI flagship flexo press and up to 600 m/ min on the ExpertCI
O Continuously search and implement innovations, be they major or just incremental ones, to decrease the carbon footprint of the equipment manufacturing and of the equipment operation once in production at a converter’s site.
The latter include a diverse range of technical solutions, depending on the machine model, but always performing in the most efficient and sustainable way possible.
Exclusive systems for waste reduction include smartGPS for the offline fully automatic register and pressure setting or smartSET, also a highly efficient system for semi-automatic on-press impression and registration set-up. Controlled inking is important under any circumstances and even more so in ECG printing. The inking system and chamber doctor blade, which optimize the temperature and flow of ink, deliver predictable, stable and controlled results with both solvent-based and water-based inks. Also concurring to superior performance, especially when printing with water-based inks at speed, are the full surface matrix (FSM) intercolor dryers which guarantees perfect drying at reduced temperatures thereby eliminating the issue of substrate stretching when handling heat sensitive substrates.
They are complemented by the high-efficiency, dual-technology bridge dryer that uses a combination of floating and impingement type air jets.
Furthermore, the use of high-efficiency motors that limit energy losses by increasing efficiency through an optimised design and of frequency control systems all contribute to reducing energy consumption.
Xwww.bobst.com
26
June 2022
www.convertermag.com
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