Sustainability Is What Packaging Adhesive Industry Is Looking For

Developing packaging adhesives can be a thankless task. Despite being the most important end market for adhesives, the effort and ingenuity used to create packaging products can go almost ignored as they are discarded to get to the contents that they protect.
Nevertheless, packaging adhesives have important roles to play in helping ensure that products are supplied in good condition, and are continually improving their ability to do so. Knowing in which area improved performance is most needed can help direct product development.This is what "Special Chem For Adhesives" has found from their recent survey.

1) Around two-thirds of the respondents chose requirements related to sustainability, while only one-third indicated that technical requirements were more important. However, the interest in renewable resources also has a direct business importance as crude oil prices hit 18-month highs in April. Many raw materials used in adhesives are currently expensive, so looking at different, potentially cheaper, sources makes clear economic sense.


2) Biodegradability was the singlemost important sustainability trend, with the focus on this issue almost exclusively in Asia. A ban on most plastic bags in China is seen as a signpost towards legislation that will accelerate the uptake of eco-friendly packaging, while government and industry in Japan are also promoting the use of biodegradable polymers. Compostability is of comparatively little concern to Specialchem4Adhesives readers, and only those based in Europe, perhaps because it could be considered a subcategory of biodegradability.


3) Similarly, the technical interest in lowering additive migration from packaging adhesives is focussed in Europe, and to a lesser extent North America. The European Commission is demanding migration of additives from adhesives be tackled by specific measures to be adopted in the near future. In the US, the Food and Drug Administration has been regulating adhesive additive migration since the 1970s under 21 C.F.R. § 175.105.

4) In adhesive lamination and co-extrusion manufacturing of gas barrier films, the choice of adhesive contributes to how much gas penetrates the final film. While some packaging must let air flow through pharmaceutical packaging and some food applications, for example, demand that the flow rate is reduced to almost 0 cm3/m2/day. Even helping achieve this by laminating other films together is challenging. However manufacturers can also strive to provide an adhesive that is such an efficient barrier by itself that eliminates the need for additional barrier films and coatings.