A print collaboration is helping to solve a recycling challenge. The challenge is how to identify the path that packaging that has been collected from households should follow. The collaboration is between Polytag, Saica Flex and Paragon Inks.
The Scottish inks company from Livingston provides UV inks with a taggant included, which are applied to packaging by Saica Flex. The taggant triggers Polytag’s scanning equipment to identify the product in the waste stream.
The Polytag system will also identify the products that have been labelled by the printer and counted for a brand to measure the recovery rate for its packaging and so demonstrate compliance with regulations including Extended Producer Responsibility.
The system has been proven with Waitrose milk cartons, the largest project using Polytag technology to date. A key part of the appeal is its simplicity and how it can be incorporated in existing supply chains without disruption.
The inks are applied in a conventional flexo press with no further changes. The development of the inks was more difficult as the ink had to be read by the Polytag scanner. Technical director Barbara Paterson says: “Creating the UV inks was a technical challenge. They needed to remain detectable by Polytag readers across a wide range of colours, substrates, and packaging formats, even after packaging has been crushed or otherwise processed. At the same time, the inks had to meet strict food-safety and environmental requirements.
“Two years of development, testing, and iterative validation went into delivering a solution that is reliable, safe, and fully compatible with existing waste management operations.”
That has been successful. The scanners are able to identify the milk cartons, triggering deflection technology to divert the cartons as required while collecting real time data. Paragon’s global sales director Martin Fowler says: “It proves the system works as intended, and this is just the beginning. The potential for other products and sectors is enormous.”
This is echoed by Polytag CEO Alice Rackley. She says: “And because it’s built on GS1 global open standards, the UV tag solution is ready to scale across multiple sectors and applications, allowing brands and recyclers to participate fully in building a transparent circular economy.”
The inks are treated like other UV inks in the recovery process itself, being chipped down or carried away if the label is floated off, without contaminating the waste stream.
Saica Flex is the UK end of a global packaging group with turnover close to €4 billion. It sees tremendous potential in the technology. Saica Flex sales and marketing director Francisco Barrera explains: “Brands need solutions that fit naturally into their operations and current production environments. This product works across the entire packaging lifecycle, from printing through recycling with minimal disruption. It gives brands meaningful insight, while remaining practical and viable even for high volume products like milk cartons.”
