Can *bling* on Print & Packaging be eco friendly?

As we celebrate Earth Day today, I thought I’d share the latest eco friendly finishings for print & packaging.

As ESG continues to affect public companies’ environmental decisions, it’s natural to see that focus trickle out to the private market.

For those companies who prioritize lowering their carbon footprint, we’re excited to introduce the newest thermal lamination to the market, that could reduce your lamination footprint up to 30%.

First, a note about the inks.

Water-based inks are the best inks for sustainability.

For the purposes of this discussion, we’re focusing on offset printing (vs digital) – and paper and carton (not flexible packaging or bags) and OPP Polypropylene.

Second, the substrate also should be recyclable.

What products might use laminations?

-????????? All types of boxes

-????????? Packaging for organic and natural products

-????????? Signage

-????????? Direct Mail

-????????? Postcards

-????????? Envelopes

-????????? Business cards

-????????? Flyers

-????????? Annual Reports

Thermal laminations can be:

-????????? Gloss

-????????? Matte

-????????? Soft touch

-????????? Haptics/Touch

-????????? Scratch and scuff resistance

Today, we can choose between:

1. Traditional Lamination Films for Offset – variety of options
2. Traditional Lamination Films for Digital – gloss, matte, (Indigo lam just out)

?OR

3. Eco friendly Films (with water based inks) for the 5 categories listed above.

What is interesting and exciting is that, aside from the environmental impact, the films are nearly similar;

“All Derprosa bioBlue laminating films offer the same technical characteristics, performance, aesthetics, and quality results as the equivalent versions made entirely from 100% traditional fossil-based materials.”

These are BOPP laminating films that use ISCC PLUS certified resins of waste vegetable origin, such as second generation BIO feedback. There are 4 films that are made-up of 30% of raw material of chemically recycled plastic origin PCR.

How is the environmentally friendly lamination better than traditional?

It uses plastic resins that come from second generation feedstock of vegetable sources such as waste cooking oil.

How does this work?

The paper products are put in the recycling bin with the other paper products. There is the recycling process where eventually the resins can be extracted and sold back to the market. Per Derprosa,

“Derprosa bioBlue is the range of BOPP laminating films that use ISCC PLUS certified resins of waste vegetable origina, such as second generation BIO feedstock.

One important note;

In thermal laminations, we have the sheet and the adhesive. The sheet is what can be made of recycled plastic origins. There is 1 biobased and biodegradable adhesive, for gloss, that can be used.

How is this tracked?

The mass balance approach makes it possible to track the amont of sustainability characteristics of circular and/or bio-based material in the value chain and attribute it based on verifiable bookkeeping.

To sum up,

We’re not there yet, but we’re getting better each year. This environmentally friendly lamination is better than the traditional lamination sheets for sustainability. By substituting these environmentally friendly sheets, you can have up to a 30% improvement with your carbon footprint. That’s a big deal!

Let me know your thoughts on this - until next time,

Julie

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