Photo courtesy of Linpac
Photo courtesy of Clariant
Photo courtesy of Eriez
The installation of a third extruder at Linpac Ritterhude is enabling the leading European food packaging manufacturer to deliver products made from up to 100% recycled content for the first time and addresses the growing demand for PET and rPET in northwest Europe.
For the past year, the German site has been able to manufacture mono sheet averaging 93% post-consumer recyclate (PCR), but the company says the new extruder provides the site with greater capacity and flexibility to manufacture products containing 100% recycled content.
In the past five years, Linpac has invested €9 million in new plant equipment at its two German sites, including €3 million on PET extrusion and automation facilities in Ritterhude, in a bid to significantly increase market share in Germany and surrounding countries.
Adam Barnett, managing director for northern Europe at Linpac, says: “This major investment demonstrates our commitment to an important market for Linpac. It is vital that, as the German market continues its shift from PP towards PET, we are able to meet growing customer demand for products which are lighter, cheaper, and more sustainable.”
Linpac has invested heavily in its in-house “supercleaning” technology to ensure its rPET meets the most stringent food safety and hygiene regulations for food packaging. The technical committee of the European Food Safety Authority vetted and approved the processes employed by Linpac in 2013, saying that products manufactured by the company did not give rise to concern for a risk to human health, even when made using 100% PCR.
Barnett adds: “Retailers and consumers are driving growth in the rPET market with demand for packaging which has strong environmental credentials; rPET is easily recycled and reduces carbon footprint by up to 70% when compared to virgin PET. Furthermore, it offers a high quality, crystal-clear material with no discoloration, boosting pack presentation for on-shelf appeal.”
The Dow Chemical Company was recently honored with the 43rd Kirkpatrick Chemical Engineering Achievement Award, a biennial recognition that honors the most noteworthy chemical-engineering technology commercialized anywhere in the world. The Award recognized Intune™, Dow’s new compatibilization technology.
Intune is the second innovation made using Dow’s proprietary olefin block copolymer platform, an advance in catalytic science and reaction engineering. Intune makes it possible to combine polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) and provide the best benefits of each material, while minimizing individual trade-off properties. It provides new flexibility for blending and bonding these important polymers, Dow says.
The technology allows designers and fabricators to engineer materials with blends or multi-layer structures containing PE and PP that take advantage of their common attributes such as low cost, low density, and environmental resistance—while combining their separate attributes in ways never before thought possible, like toughness, ease of processing, stiffness, and high-temperature resistance.
It can also allow property retention with the addition of PE or PP recycled content, the company adds.
Clariant, a leader in specialty chemicals, has announced the introduction of a new liquid additive masterbatch that minimizes yellowing and graying of PET polymers caused by the introduction of post-consumer recycled resin (PCR).
The new optical brightening products, which are part of the HiFormer® family of liquid masterbatch and application technology, can be used in a wide variety of PET resin grades and processes, including injection-blow molding, injection molding, and extrusion. The additive has received approval for food-contact applications from the U.S. Food & Drug Administration, the company adds.
“Packagers are under heavy pressure from consumers and environmental advocates to use more PCR in their products,” explains Peter Prusak, head of marketing, Clariant Masterbatches North America. “But the recyclate tends to reduce or discolor the crystal clarity that PET is known for. Clariant’s new HiFormer PET-enhancing additives promise to minimize this problem, opening new opportunities for more sustainable packaging.”
The liquid masterbatches are resistant to sedimentation and segmentation, so they offer extended storage shelf life. They’re also easy to use in gravimetric metering systems that ensure accurate dosing and clean operation.
The liquid additives were reportedly tested on a production-scale blow-molding machine in the company’s facility in East Chicago, Illinois. Bottles made using 25% recycled PET and 75% virgin PET and no brightening additive were compared against bottles made with the same PCR resin and the additive in concentrations of 0.025, 0.035, and 0.05%. While the unmodified bottles showed significant yellowing, all the bottles made with the HiFormer additive were visibly brighter (i.e., less yellow and more blue).
“The human eye perceives yellowness as dirty or hazy, while blue light is seen as cleaner and clearer,” explains Prusak. “What is most significant, and what is most exciting to me, is how we can shift that blue value so dramatically with just 0.05% additive loading.”
Eriez offers a variety of mechanical conveyors engineered to move large amounts of bulk material for plastics processing operations. Many of these rugged, efficient, high-capacity units feature a compact, straight-line design along with an extremely low profile for easy maintenance. Minimum headroom is required for installation, the company adds.
The conveyors are available in single-mass and two-mass vibrating systems excited by a motor-driven eccentric shaft. Springs and trough sizes vary according to the type of application. Popular models include the Eriez® Horizontal Motion Conveyor, High Volume Vibrating Conveyor, and VMC Electromagnetic Conveyor, among others.
For instance, Eriez’s E-Z Slide™ Horizontal Motion Conveyor features a smooth, positive-sliding action to shuffle products along without breakage and without disturbing coatings on coated parts. The company says that in plastics processing applications, noise is greatly reduced because parts gently slide along the tray bottom. Drop-gate discharge mechanisms can be provided along the length of the tray to allow materials to be deposited onto other conveyors or feeders.