KRAIBURG TPE teams up with Pune Polymers in upgrading mask protection

KRAIBURG TPE, a global TPE manufacturer of a diverse range of thermoplastic elastomer products and custom solutions for a variety of industries, collaborated with Indian OEM manufacturer Pune Polymers Pvt Ltd to improve mask design through the use of its THERMOLAST® TPE compound.

Reusable face masks are a critical component of global health protocols, and depending on the quality, they can limit virus transmissions effectively. Since these barrier devices must be worn for long durations to prevent and contain the spread of disease, they should be comfortable for the wearer. Furthermore, fitments is a necessary aspect in reducing user discomfort. Due to their flexibility, excellent design freedom, and efficient processability, thermoplastic elastomers (TPEs) fulfil the reusable mask industry’s criteria for mask applications.

KRAIBURG TPE, a recognized global manufacturer in superior TPE compounds supplied its THERMOLAST® TPE compound to Pune Polymers Pvt Ltd, an Indian-based OEM manufacturer, to produce the Jivanakk FFP3 (Filtering Face Piece 3) mask.

Keeping users safe from virus infections
FFP3 masks have been recommended for healthcare workers’ use who are at high risk of hospital-acquired infections, since they can provide thorough protection against Covid-19, especially when performing aerosol generating procedures.

The Jivanakk FFP3 mask design technology was developed by India’s leading nuclear research facility, the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre. Jivanakk’s innovative structure enables the mask to provide a comfortable yet snug fit on various facial shapes, while eliminating the fogging problem experienced by eyeglass wearers.

The mask’s HEPA filter is able to filter bacteria, viruses, and pollen with a size of 0.3 micron or larger at up to 99.97%. The filter, which can be used for 90 days or more, has a long-life cycle and can be easily adjusted by the user.

Furthermore, the mask can also be disassembled and washed with soap and water after extended use or when it becomes contaminated.

Material advantages of THERMOLAST® compound
KRAIBURG TPE’s THERMOLAST® compound was selected due to its excellent bonding with thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU), allowing for design flexibility, as requested by Pune Polymers for the Jivanakk FFP3 mask. The soft touch texture of the TPE compound adds cushioned comfort to the mask wearer, and it also does not cause allergies or irritations on the skin. In addition, the halogen-free compound conforms to food regulations such as EU Directive 10/2011, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), Title 21, and the EN71/3 European safety standard, as well as the RoHS and REACH standards.

THERMOLAST® H for the healthcare sector in Asia-Pacific KRAIBURG TPE recently introduced its new THERMOLAST® H product line exclusively for the Asia Pacific healthcare and medical devices market.

Available in the THERMOLAST® H series of compounds is the high-quality HC/AP series material solution.

It satisfies the global criteria for food contact and medical grade materials, such as cytotoxicity ISO 10993-5 and GB/T 16886.5.

Furthermore, the HC/AP series’ exhibit exceptional properties, like adherence to polymers such as PP, haptics, and compression set, making it ideal for masks and medical device component applications.

With its easy processability advantage, the HC/AP series is also targeted at closures, flexible connections, medical tubing, syringe gaskets, catheter connectors, mouthpieces, and other medical device applications.

Xeikon launches groundbreaking TITON technology in response to sustainability trends in packaging

To meet industry needs for sustainable printing methods and environmentally friendly packaging production, Xeikon announces TITON technology, a new toner formulation offering all the benefits of UV inks without the disadvantages.

“The flexible packaging market is moving towards more sustainable paper-based solutions in response to strong consumer demand for plastic-free alternatives,” says Frank Jacobs, Market Intel & Senior Product Manager. “With the new TITON technology, Xeikon is offering a sustainable solution for an unexplored and wider variety of applications to fully support brand owners, designers and printers wishing to increase their use of paper-based packaging for food products.”

Food-safe and odorless
TITON builds on the core value of Xeikon dry toner technology which, due to the absence of any liquid (mobile) components, is the most food-safe technology in the digital landscape, even with only paper as the main functional barrier. As it is also completely odor- and tasteless, it will not affect the customer experience when the product is consumed. These key characteristics make TITON toner suitable for a broad range of applications with indirect and direct food contact.

TITON toner also impresses by the excellent resistance to scuffing and scratching, water, sunlight, high temperatures and a large set of liquid chemicals, without any type of protective layers such as varnishing or lamination. A substantial feature is the ability to withstand heat sealing temperatures of up to 220-260°C (428-500°F), which is crucial to maintaining the pack’s integrity and protecting the product.

As brand owners continue to convert film-based packaging to paper, TITON can be employed to print many types of flexible packaging for food products. It can be used for papers that are coated on one side for bags, pouches and sachets, or on both sides for wrappers such as baked goods, confectionery, sugar, flour, herbs and spices, and coffee and tea.

Allowing brand owners to move to recyclable paper-based packaging puts TITON technology in a groundbreaking position in the digital printing landscape, and it gives printers the opportunity to expand their capabilities into applications that could not previously be addressed with digital, complementing their conventional flexo presses.

“With the migration towards paper-based packaging printing, the demand on the print technology has become more stringent in terms of being food safe without a plastic functional barrier or plastic lamination to protect the print itself,” states Jacobs.

Improving OEE
Being able to print directly on paper substrates without varnishing or lamination, either inline or offline, has a significant impact on the Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) of the digital printing operation. Varnishing and lamination require additional setup time and create more waste in the process. Furthermore, water-based varnishes used to achieve food safety require a significant amount of maintenance, which eatsinto productive uptime. Lamination can also negatively affect the recyclability of the packaging. TITON toner is the only digital solution that can address this market without the time and cost implications of further surface processes, thereby improving speed to market, profitability, and productivity.

The first digital press model to run TITON technology will be the Xeikon CX500t, a new member of the CHEETAH series. Adding extra capabilities to the successful 508mm (20 inches) wide machine, with the new toner technology, allows converters to broaden their reach and enter new market segments.

“Once again, Xeikon is paving the way for converters to future-proof their business by developing solutions that help them stay ahead of the curve and respond to market needs for high quality, sustainable and cost-effective solutions. It reaffirms our dedication to the labels and packaging market and is the perfect illustration that application-tuned products are key to driving growth.”

“The ground-breaking TITON toner brings new market opportunities for digital print that no other digital technology can offer, and it will set a new standard in flexible packaging production,” concludes Jacobs. Visitors to the Xeikon Café in Lier, Belgium, on April 26–28 can experience TITON technology in action during the live press demos. To register, please visit Xeikon Café 2022 – Label & packaging innovation | Xeikon.

Way2K: Industry interviews in the lead-up to the K 2022 trade fair

“The circular economy needs holistic recycling solutions”
Interview with Alaaddin Aydin, Managing Director of Maag Germany GmbH

Mr. Aydin, how do we get to grips with the problem of plastic waste? That question is not an easy one to answer, and always depends on how plastic is handled. Where there is no infrastructure present, and no coordinated set of rules, the sensible handling of plastic waste is not possible. This is very harmful for us. The plastics industry alone cannot solve this problem. Politics, in cooperation with industry and trade, must set up the infrastructure and framework conditions to ensure controlled and traceable flows of recyclable materials, and prevent the transfer of risks to third countries.

How can the circular economy be pushed forward?
The plastics industry and trade have been working for some time on solutions to keep recyclables in the loop and increase the share of secondary materials in products. Manufacturers of plastic products are increasingly making their products recyclable and are also increasing the recycled content in their production. However, products must also be repairable – there is still a lot to be done on this point. Many products are not repairable and are still simply replaced when they are defective. Repairing must be worthwhile.

Here are two simple examples: Efficiency can be significantly increased with solutions for total predictive maintenance or online quality controls. The discussion must be objectified and solution-oriented. Plastics will then generally be part of the solution and not the problem. In the end, everyone must work towards a common goal – industry, politics, but also society.

We have already made good progress in Germany.
Yes, a lot is being done here, but there is also still a lot to do. There are many good initiatives by all parties involved. Topics such as resource efficiency, a climate-neutral circular economy and the creation of industrial infrastructures for a circular economy are often tackled in solidarity. However, most challenges can only be solved at European level or internationally. In addition to technological innovations, clear rules are needed that are as unbureaucratic as possible, apply to everyone, and ensure a level playing field.

What is the role of industry and, in particular, mechanical engineering?
Mechanical engineering is a solution provider, which is also how we see ourselves at Maag. We can offer solutions that avoid production waste, increase the drive towards the efficient use of energy and raw materials, and ensure recyclability at the end of a product’s life cycle. For example, plastics manufacturers are working hard on solutions to avoid composites and offer the same functions by mono-materials, making plastic products easier to recycle. There are advances in traceable recyclable material streams and identifiability of plastics for single-species recycling, both chemically and mechanically. One thing is certain: the circular economy needs holistic recycling solutions.

What role does digitalisation play in this?
It plays a decisive role. The more efficient production is, and the more secondary materials are used, the less the impact is on the environment. The topic of the circular economy is omnipresent in the news and the trade press, and companies are facing up to this challenge and the resulting tasks.

And what contribution do consumers need to make?
A shift needs to happen in the way of thinking within our society. As a consumer, it is not enough to complain about plastic waste streams in the oceans and the imminent climate change. We also have to change our own behaviour and treat raw materials and products with respect. This means, for example, that you don’t just replace a product because there is a newer model, but that you use it until the end of its physical or technological life. It also means that you don’t order three items of clothing and then return two. In the case of clothing, the trend towards fast fashion means that a significant proportion ends up in the bin without being worn. In the end, consumers also influence industry and trade through their purchasing behaviour.

What technological contributions is Maag offering to solve the problems?
We offer solutions for mechanical recycling among other things. At the heart of this is our high-performance Ettlinger melt filter, which can extract up to 16 percent weight volume from the plastic, depending on the application – with minimal material loss. Our sixth generation pumps, which are now also available specifically for recycling applications, can tolerate particle sizes of up to 4 millimetres, so that even in post-consumer recycling applications, service lives have been doubled. We also offer complete downstream solutions, including granulation. We have completely redesigned the granulators, so that the same size machines now have 40 percent more output. Availability of the systems has also been increased, and the service life of wearing components has been considerably extended, so that unplanned downtimes have been minimised. This in turn leads to considerably reduced production waste during the start-up and shutdown of the lines. Conversely, this means that we can offer smaller plants with improved performance and reliability, which entails less installation space, less energy input, less production waste and improved product quality.

Heerenveen (Netherlands), March 2022. Europe’s first independent testing and research centre with facilities on industrial scale, the NTCP (National Test centre Circular Plastics), in the Netherlands, founded in 2018, has set out to examine the behaviour of different plastics during sorting and washing. The goal is to optimise processes quantitatively, qualitatively and with more efficient energy use, in order to promote plastics recycling in line with the circular economy model. Dutch and foreign clients are already showing great interest in the testing options. “With its modular design, Lindner Washtech’s plastic washing system, to be installed in mid-2022, will make a significant contribution to our research and the optimisation of various plastic streams,” says Martine Brandsma, director of the NTCP.

Tucked away in Friesland, a northern Dutch province, lies the 50.000-strong community of Heerenveen. Since 2018, it has also been home to the National Test centre Circular Plastics (NTCP). It is Europe’s first independent testing and research centre which can analyse heterogeneous plastic waste streams down to the smallest part. Rather than relying on usual test set-ups which are commonly used in research institutions, it is instead equipped with state-of-the-art facilities: raw, industrial, noisy and… using real waste.

Playing with the Settings
NTCP’s concept is actually quite simple: the more plastic that enters the correct sorting stream and then takes the correct route to the relevant mechanical and chemical recyclers, the higher the percentage of plastics that remain in the loop. Though this may sound simple in theory, the reality is more complex. According to Brandsma, “It’s like a chess game, played on seven boards all at once – and chess moves are being made on each one.” When one applies this to recycling, this means that everyone who takes part in the process – be it the collectors, sorters or recyclers – is in a constant state of development. This means that the system too is constantly changing. In order to examine individual or larger steps in the process, the NTCP has a 25 by 20 metre long, and 9 metre high, industrial sorting system. This simulates the entire sorting process (up to 2 t/h). The modular design allows for settings to be adapted to different testing requirements, which can then be analysed in detail. In this way, one can also test how different sorting techniques interact.

A New Washing System
NTCP’s current sorting system takes up half of the thousand square metres of available production space. The other half is reserved for a new washing system, which will be commissioned from and installed by the plastic recycling specialist Lindner Washtech in August 2022. Lindner Washtech’s modular system allows for each individual step of the washing process to be examined and quantified in detail. Freek Van Rhijn, technical director of the NTCP says, “Soon we will be able to simulate and optimise the entire washing process for all materials. From shredding, dry washing, cold and hot washing, density separation, mechanical and thermal drying, all the way to separating with a flake sorter. We can also focus on the detergents required and the environmental impact of using more or less water. How does washing by five or ten degrees less affect energy consumption? What ends up in the waste water and how much does it cost to dispose of? With the new washing system, we can examine every single step, from sorting all the way to the final clean plastic flake.”

For several months, Van Rhijn has worked closely with Lindner Washtech’s engineers to develop the new plastic washing system. Harald Hoffmann, the firm’s Managing Director from Großbottwar (Germany), is happy to actively help shape this flagship project. He is convinced that the testing system as a whole will have a huge impact on the recycling industry and is a major leap forward. “The modular system will soon make it possible for different types of plastic to undergo different washing tests. This is made more feasible as the modules can be independently integrated into the process. In addition, the washing modules can be separately adapted to the requirements of each kind of plastic and its degree of contamination. This flexibility creates multiple opportunities for process optimisation at every step of the way, while ensuring high-quality recycled material. This kind of research and testing not only actively contributes to recycling profitability, it also increases the rate of recycling and environmental protection,” says Hoffmann.

In addition to supplying the complex washing system, made up of flexible and highly specialised components, Lindner Washtech is also including a universal plastic shredder from its Antares series, as well as a wet granulator. The washing process can be minutely adapted through its different components to suit any kind of input material and its varying degrees of contamination. To this end, a dry cleaner, pre-washer, friction washer or various hot-wash components are also available. The client can choose from various options when it comes to material separation and drying – which can be chosen to develop and design the optimal process for the material at hand. The NTCP system will be equipped with a mechanical dryer, a step dryer, as well as thermal drying specifically for plastic film.

Independent Advice
Since the NTCP is an independent, not-for-profit organisation, it reinvests all its profits, and equally addresses different organisations and stakeholders within the circular plastic recycling chain. Many national and international companies have already expressed an interest in collaborations and partnerships. Freek van Rhijn, who came on board as technical director in October 2019, is not surprised that NTCP has logged so many orders since its inception: “When people come here, they can’t believe their eyes. They may have imagined a lab with a few small machines, but this is a real industrial plant. Everyone we speak to sees the benefits of operating at this scale.” Orders have come in from a variety of large and small firms, including sorters, recyclers, brand owners, retailers, packers and other stakeholders in the plastic recycling industry. These, alongside international brands, have all approached the NTCP with research and testing requests. Lindner Washtech also intends to use this facility to further develop its washing components and to test prototypes. “In future, we want to make the most of the NTCP’s testing possibilities for our own research and development. We will also ensure that our latest innovations are made available to the NTCP for test runs. Ultimately, the entire plastics industry benefits from testing facilities of this magnitude,” says Georg Krenn,
Technical Director at Lindner Washtech.

Preferred Testing and Research Partner
The NTCP will continue on its path to achieve the firm goal of increasing the amount of recycled material and accelerating innovation across recycling chains. Director Martine Brandsma even foresees sustainable plastic playing a prominent role across Europe. “We have the ambition to be the preferred partner for testing and research in the field of household waste streams. We are already eighty percent on track to reach our target for 2022. In just a short time, we’ve already been recognised as an independent partner, with our results being confirmed and accepted on a national and international level. On the one hand, this shows that there is an enormous need for our services. On the other hand, it is a confirmation that we have set up our business model successfully and our projects are achieving great results. We’re just a small team here at NTCP, so that’s something we are very proud of.”