PETpla.net Insider 01+02 / 2020

LABELLING PET planet Insider Vol. 21 No. 01+02/20 www.petpla.net 29 LABELLING 29 Beyond the facestock, the adhe- sive matters too. It makes an impact both during manufacture and when entering the recycling stream, with which an adhesive should, ideally, be fully compatible. It should facilitate removal of itself from the stream (see CleanFlake technology, below). Release liners can make up 35% of the laminate, so improvements in this area can have a strong impact on sustainability. In the past, liners have posed a difficult recycling challenge; especially silicone-coated ‘glassine’ materials. Significant improvements have already been made with glassine recycling but one of the most impor- tant developments, for both sustain- ability and productivity, is that many label liners are also now made from PET. The benefits of PET release liners Sustainability gains from PET liners begin with the fact that they are thinner. Using 30 μm PET liner, or the 23 μm version, reduces the amount of material needed, compared with a conventional glassine liner. Pressure- sensitive laminates can therefore be made thinner, which means more labels on an equal size roll and so fewer trucks on the road. More meters of labels on a longer roll also means longer production runs, with less startup and changeover waste. So far, so good, but PET comes into its own still further when taking recycling into account. If care is taken to remove silicone, and to keep the PET separate from other plas- tics, the liners can be recycled into useful products such as thermoform- able sheets, for making trays, fibre or strapping. Avery Dennison has an expanding program in place to collect and recycle PET liners and has also launched the first commercially-availa- ble recycled content PET (rPET) label liner, which is made from carefully selected post-consumer waste (PCW). Dealing with post-consumer waste PET can play an important role in finding applications for PCW. Clean- Flake, a recent Avery Dennison innovation, has closed the loop for PET packaging; the new technology won the 2019 FINAT Recy- cling and Sustainability award. CleanFlake facilitates clean separation of labels from PET containers in the conventional recycling process, leaving high quality PET flakes behind. The reduced levels of contamina- tion from label facestock, ink and adhesive allow the produc- tion of food-grade recycled PET (rPET), suitable for making PET bottles or other food packag- ing – new bottles made from old bottles. A key benefit of CleanFlake technology is that it does not compromise on pro- ductivity or shelf appeal. It also meets widely varying recycling standards in many European countries, including PETcore and EPBP EU. Additional sustainability benefits can be achieved with the right choice of label release liner. For example, a million square metres of labels on an rPET23 liner (which contains 30% post-consumer waste) can reduce resource use (com- pared with a virgin PET23 liner) as follows: fossil fuel -30% (59 barrels of oil), energy use -11% (equivalent to 4.8 house- holds for a year) and emission of Greenhouse gases -14% (equivalent to taking 4.2 cars off the road per year). The future Further cost-effective improvements to sustainability are urgently needed. Waste is an inevitable by-product of the labelling process but we must prevent large volumes going to landfill or incinera- tion. Realistic ways to source and recycle responsibly do exist; the options offered by Avery Dennison are expanding rapidly, in collaboration with brand owners, packaging sup- pliers and recyclers. Once all parties in the supply chain are properly engaged – and the right materials made available – labelling can become part of the solution to the sustainabil- ity challenge. www.averydennison.com For more information about BERICAP TetheredCaps: BERICAP TetheredCap Easy handling Safe application No change to • Neck finish • Capper • Filling line