Light weighting for stronger environment impact
Sustainable packaging involves designing a pack for increased
use of life cycle inventory (LCI) and life cycle assessment (LCA) to help develop
a packaging that reduces the environmental impact and ecological footprint. It
includes a look at the whole of the supply chain: from basic function, to
marketing & value communication, and then through to end of life (LCA) and
rebirth.
Light weighting is a sustainable practice that aims at
maintaining the life cycle of inventory while reducing its carbon footprint by limiting
the usage of plastic. It is a process by which the existing packaging is
adjusted and redesigned to reduce the overall weight of the item. Light
weighting is done by innovations in materials, like replacing packaging
material with a lighter weight alternative as done using the foaming technology
or cutting down the amount of packaging material by redesigning the packaging.
A recent innovation in light-weighting is foaming
technology. Foaming is a process that is accomplished by controlled
infusion of inert gases like CO2/N2 etc in a suitable layer of polyolefins.
This allows overall reduction of the density of the plastic material and hence
lighter weight. Following the principles
of light-weighting, at Manjushree we have been able to achieve a weight
reduction of up to 20% for one of our malt-based health drink supplements manufacturing
clients.
Redesigning is another technique to achieve light-weighting.
We have been proactively offering light-weighting solutions through various
design innovations to our customers over the history of our association with
them. Our unique designs towards light-weighting are already proven like Super
Short Neck Jars/Caps is one of the patents. We have recently introduced the
Neck Support Ring (NSR) which will enable to reduce the weight of the
Bottle/Cap and a couple of patents are in pipeline especially towards Light
weighting plus tamper-evident features. For some of our beverage customers, we
have achieved lighter weight up to 34% in PET by reducing the wall thickness or
thin walling the packaging design.
Frequently
asked questions
Light-weighting of PET, how can it be done?
Light-weighting of PET can be achieved by redesigning packaging material to reduce
the weight without compromising its quality. The redesigning can be simple like
replacing handles with grips within the packaging design to hold a container.
Light weighting in PET can also be achieved by thin walling of containers to reduce
material used.
How can
the redesigning technique be achieved?
Design is
critical and each material type has its own challenges. There are several
factors we keep in mind while redesigning packaging - For example, in PET
beverage bottles/containers, the redesigning is achieved by following some of
these techniques
a)
Introduction
of technical ribs in the right places to maintain top load with lower wall thicknesses
b)
Reducing
weight in necks where no internal gas pressures are involved
c)
By
redesigning the shape of the container /bottle
d)
By
using higher I.V. resins wherever possible
It is also
important to consider the filling operations of the packaging. If the bottles
are filled using ‘Jet Stream’ air systems which work with neck handling, then
the bottles must have a special space below the lowest part of the neck to
transport the bottles in the filling line.
Labeling
is another important element to consider in a light-weighting project. If a
thin-walled bottle is labeled before filling, it is more flexible, making
labeling difficult and inaccurate. It is therefore important that light-weighted bottles especially the ones that are thin-walled should be labeled after
the filling.
Is
Manjushree exploring light-weighting for PET products?
We have been proactively offering light-weighting solutions
through various design innovations to our customers. We have done design
innovations like thin walling for water bottles, replacing handles with
in-mold grips for efficient handling of milk jars/bottles apart from various super
short neck jars made for different customers.
Chat with us to know more about our sustainability projects.
