Amid much ado about plastic straws, Jason Forgash of Michigan’s Bay Plastics Machinery is thinking inside the box — namely, the BPM Straw Cutter, a countertop unit that ingests the pesky little pipes, shreds them, and bags the remnants for recycling. Forgash, BPM CEO and president, began thinking of the project a few years ago before handing his concept over to BPM’s engineers to make it a reality. After three iterations,…
If you’re interested in an informative and fast read on the subject of flexible packaging, this is for you — an all-in-one location for a steady stream of curated news and developments in this dynamic market. These include pouches, bags, films, and other types of flexible packaging sourced from supplier breakthroughs, brand launches, and other advances of interest. The content is selected from Tweets by stakeholders in the flexible packaging supply chain supplemented by content…
Sabic is spotlighting two diverse transportation applications that demonstrate the potential benefits of Sabic PP-UMS (Polypropylene – Ultra Melt Strength) foam resin at NPE2024 (Booth S19005). The material features high melt strength for high levels of foamability and enables the extrusion of PP foams with very low density, good impact resistance, and compliance with VDA 278 emission regulations. Sabic PP-UMS foam resin’s processing versatility allows PP foams, subject to user testing,…
Performance materials distributor Formerra announced at NPE2024 that it has earned approval to begin selling ISCC PLUS–certified materials for the mass balance process. Formerra also will supply compostable products from AFC Ecoplastics to consumer and medical packaging customers across North America in answer to growing customer demand for sustainable alternatives and more stringent plastics regulations. The mass balance approach to making plastics combines alternative renewable or circular feedstock with fossil-based…
Polypropylene is a polymer seeing a lot of positive traction in food packaging including food cups. That’s due to PP’s material’s sustainability and recyclability back into food-grade resin. A new twist in packaging introduced at NPE2024 looks to get in on that action using tried-and-true PET. The innovation uses that most widely recycled polymer in a source-reduced, thin-wall cup that’s paired with a PET film applied via in-mold labeling (IML).…
Environment Climate Change Canada (ECCC) has awarded a six-month, six-figure contract to Vancouver, BC-based Metaspectral to test an artificial-intelligence-enabled plastic-film sorting technology. The CAD$150,000/$108,962 contract is part of the Canadian Plastics Innovation Challenge, a program focused on improving the collection and sorting of flexible packaging and other plastic films in Canada. Metaspectral’s technology uses specialized cameras to capture hyperspectral images of waste plastics, thus detecting the materials’ chemical signatures. Deep…
Engel has announced that it will build a multi-faceted facility in Queretaro, Mexico, as part of its “close to the customer” corporate philosophy. The maker of injection molding equipment based in Schwertberg, Austria, with its US headquarters in York, PA, said it wants to establish “optimal sales, logistics, and production structures for each of the three major regions — Europe, Asia, and the Americas.” A place to find and develop…
Market demand for high-content post-consumer recycled (PCR) material is growing rapidly as industries step up efforts in pursuit of circularity and climate neutrality. Retaining performance and quality on a par with virgin resin, however, remains a common challenge. Achieving a 90% PCR content polycarbonate (PC) requires both high-quality PCR feedstock and a robust formulation process, something that materials supplier Covestro claims to have achieved with its Makrolon PCR PC resin…
As you walk the NPE show floor, you might be hypnotized by the city-block-long injection molding machines ejecting plastic parts with metronomic precision, dazzled by blown film machines reaching to the sky, and entertained by robots performing their intricate choreography, to name a few of the main attractions. But you know as well as anyone that it takes a supporting cast of auxiliary equipment to keep your plastics processing operation…
Arburg set the initial course for its “local-to-local” activities back in 2020, with the opening of the Arburg Technology Factory (ATF) in Pinghu, China, near Shanghai. Initially, activities focused on adapting Allrounder machines to customer-specific requirements and implementing turnkey systems in cooperation with local suppliers of molds and peripheral equipment. This was followed in 2023 by the Flexlift linear robotic system and now the Allrounder Golden Electric EVO. Both product…