
19BOBST |
BEST PRACTICE REPRESENTATIVE 2018
food packaging industry. It is essential
that all food packaging has the
appropriate protection – or “barrier”
– to prevent oxygen and moisture
getting inside the packaging and
thus spoiling the food. A high barrier
extends the shelf life of the product,
therefore reducing food waste.
Research and development work is
carried out in our BOBST Competence
Centres on the most commonly used
flexible substrates for food packaging.
These include polypropylene
(PP), polyester (PET), nylon, cast
polypropylene (CPP) and polyethylene
(PE), all of which help to develop
the latest state-of-the-art vacuum
metallisation equipment and wet
coating equipment for the application
of top coats.
We are able to rapidly optimise and
prototype packaging solutions for the
industry, by using novel combinations
of vacuum and wet coatings and
exploiting various working synergies
across the BOBST Group. This focuses
on the amalgamation and appropriate
use of two different methods of
vacuum coating and wet coating,
which provide improved barrier and
therefore improved shelf life for brand
owners’ products.
Innovative solutions for
recycling
One of the key advantages of vacuum
metallisation is the ability to achieve
an excellent barrier to oxygen and
moisture at extremely thin coating
weights, often of a thickness around
ten nanometres. When this is
compared to conventional wet coating
layers, which may be one or two
microns thick, the amount of vacuum-
deposited material is insignificant.
This makes it much easier to recycle,
an important consideration for brand
owners going forward.
For good environmental sustainability,
the target is to move to mono-material
substrates; historically, in our industry,
food packaging solutions have been
designed to optimise appearance,
packing line speed and barrier
properties with little or no regard
for ease of recycling. Consequently,
the majority of flexible packages are
made up of different materials, most
of which are not compatible to be
recycled together. So, for recycling
to take place, the materials need to
be separated – a huge obstacle for
theprocess.
The technology shift required to
move to mono-material substrates
and thus easily recycled material will
necessitate significant investment.
This means that co-operation along
the value chain is necessary to work
on end-to-end solutions. In keeping
with this, we have recently forged new
partnerships across industry where we
have focused our resources and have
thus been participating in a number
ofinitiatives.
One such example was the search
for unified sustainability and
recycling solutions for mono-
material substrates, co-ordinated by
leading packaging experts. We knew
that achieving this would require
collaboration along the value chain,
Fully recyclable PE barrier
solution
Research and
development
work is carried
out in our
BOBST
Competence
Centres
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