An Interview with Shreyas Pathak — Lamination in Packaging

The lamination process has been used by the packaging industry for decades now. However, with the rising environmental hazards, packaging laminations for custom mailer boxes with logo have become a challenging task.

Working for a printing ink manufacturing company, Shreyas Pathak has been in the US for almost four years now. Shreyas Pathak remains the most experienced when it comes to matters concerning printing technology. With an educational background in paper and printing from Western Michigan University and an M.S in Paper and Printing Science, Pathak's interview regarding lamination in packaging has been very informative.

Here are some of the key highlights of the interview.

Eco-friendliness of the lamination in packaging

The use of plastic lamination for different types of product packaging requirements is not eco-friendly at all. In fact, it makes the recycling of biodegradable products i.e., paper, cardboard, etc much harder instead.

As we all know, plastics have been very hard to recycle from the very beginning and when it comes to packaging laminates, we are talking of different layers of plastics for a single product. Therefore, making the recycling process either too hard to achieve or too expensive to bear its costs.

The reason for it is that when different layers of plastics in lamination are fused, it's pretty difficult to separate them let alone recycle. That's why opting for alternatives like varnishes is becoming the new trend in the industry.

Paper laminates

Recycling the laminates is hard no matter what type of plastic you are using. However, when it comes to paper laminates, they are way more eco-friendly yet don't offer barrier characteristics that plastic laminations can.

Recyclability of laminations

If a product box/packaging is laminated, there exists some sort of polymer or adhesive that combines the two products together. Therefore, such stuff remains very hard to recycle. Even if one is to recycle it, not 100% of it is going to be recyclable, no matter what you do. Hence, a major part of it has to end up in landfills.

There's a possibility that future innovations can make separating plastics from each other much more convenient, easy, and affordable. So, if something like that ever happens, surfaces printed can easily be recycled through the use of volatile solvents i.e., getting rid of the graphics on them. Afterward, send them for reuse or recycling.

Recycling plastic or buying new plastic material; which is affordable?

Surprisingly, it's affordable for a business to buy new plastic packaging materials for the Custom packaging boxes wholesale ten recycling them. So, makes the application of recycled plastic much more challenging in modern times because no one would ever want to buy recycled plastic when opting for new plastic is cheaper.

Though the great barrier properties plastic has to offer for the safety of your packaging and product, it's the worst when it comes to sustainability.

So, that's how plastic laminates can be hazardous to our environment and what the future of the packaging industry would look like.