At K 2022, visitors showed high interests in making green and circular packaging a reality, and saving resources in production. Let's take a look at some of innovative technologies showcased for sustainable packaging.

BOBST and partners unveiled oneBARRIER PrimeCycle, a polymer-based mono-material that is recycle-ready while retaining high barrier qualities, making it a potentially groundbreaking development for sustainable packaging.

The Generation 3.0 “hero samples” the company revealed were various examples of food packaging, are another significant evolution from the 1.0 version first presented at K 2019. BOBST’s partners involved in oneBARRIER PrimeCycle include Dow, Michelman, Sun Chemical and Zermatt.

Another breakthrough, oneBARRIER FibreCycle, is a full paper, mono-material, recycle-ready solution that BOBST created together with Michelman and UPM, in response to increasing demand in the industry for more paper-based packaging options.

Together with converter Huhtamaki, BOBST has revealed the first ever hero samples of converted packaging using the FibreCycle solution, representing another exciting and significant milestone for sustainable packaging.

Milliken & Company showcased new measures to advance the circular economy through chemistry.

Exhibits at its booth included, for example, Millad NX 8000 ECO, a clarifying agent for PP that boosts clarity, enables faster production rates and reduces energy use. It is UL certified, and provides average energy savings of 10% for the production of injection molded clarified PP parts or products.

Hyperform HPN was another focus for Milliken. This performance additive for PP delivers an improved balance in properties between stiffness and impact resistance while reducing energy use.

Also certified by UL, it enables 5% to 8% energy savings when it is used as nucleator for production of thin-wall injection molded PP container lids and similar PP applications.

ExxonMobil demonstrated how its performance polymers are helping its value chain partners create sustainable solutions and products that are making life better.

Matt Loach, Polyethylene Global Marketing Manager at ExxonMobil, introduced the company's 6-bottles bundle collation shrink pack with 50% PCR. Exceed S 9243 and Enable 4002 are used in this 5-layer, 40 micron collation shrink film to help ensure that the film delivers acceptable holding force, stiffness, puncture and TD shrink.

This is a mono-material, lightweight solution that uses less materials and can be recycled where programs and facilities to collect and recycle plastic films exist.

Besides, the recyclable stand-up pouch presented is a recycling solution that turns stand-up pouches into heavy duty sacks. It starts with the creation of fully recyclable 96% PE stand-up pouch which, as a result of using ExxonMobil performance polymers and AlOx/wet coatings, does not compromise on barrier, mechanical or optical performance.

Once used, the stand-up pouches are mechanically recycled. A new formulation, including 30-50% recycled content with ExxonMobil performance polymers to help boost film performance, is created for high-end, heavy-duty sacks used to package polymer resins.

Starlinger was producing its AD*STAR* block bottom valve sacks with 22 % recycled content on its new sack conversion line ad*starKON SXneo at its stand. In this way, the company showed that it is possible to use recycled material in woven plastic packaging, which is manufactured in a complex process, without having to accept a loss of quality.

Starlinger lines can produce and process woven fabric with rPP and rPET. Industrial packaging such as big bags made of woven PP are equipped with a material passport that allows to trace their life cycle from production and use to return and recycling.

And with the technology for producing tape fabric from PET and rPET, Starlinger has harnessed this major benefit for woven packaging. PET tape fabric is high-strength, food grade, has high creep resistance and can be made from 100% recycled material.

Due to their high dimensional stability, PET and rPET big bags are suitable for long-term storage of bulk goods and provide a cost-effective alternative to octabins and cardboard cylinders.

W&H featured how to manufacture recyclable packaging products with maximum efficiency. Its focus at the trade fair was also on particularly demanding applications, such as barrier films or packaging with an increased percentage of PIR/PCR.

Macchi displayed its R-POD FLEX line, the latest evolution of the innovative POD FLEX system (Polyolefin dedicated), specifically designed for very high productivity and for the use of "secondary" raw materials (regenerated/recycled).

The 5-layer R-POD FLEX line is conceived for sustainable specialty films with reduced thickness, good sealing, and high optical and mechanical properties.

This new technology allows meeting the growing market demand of highly flexible extrusion lines, capable of extruding recycled materials up to 1200 kg/h at 2500 mm net width.