Issue 04/2016

Application News
Clear packaging from
Bio-PET 30
The company Seufert Transparente Verpackungen
(Rodgau, Germany) can now offer a new material: Bio-
PET. It allows producing resource-saving transparent
packaging at nearly the same costs as traditional clear
packaging. Seufert is working with Bio-PET film, which
is partly manufactured from renewable resources. I.e.
the 30 % by wt MEG (monoethylene glycol) is produced
from sugar cane, while the 70 % by wt. terephthalic acid
(PTA) are still made from petroleum. However, worldwide
research into finding a plant based alternative for the PTA
content is still ongoing. Bio-PET may be transformed
into clear folding boxes, transparent sleeves and die cuts
in the same way as standard PET.
The benefits are clear. Thanks to using more renewable
resources, less raw material derived from petroleum is
needed. This is a subject consumers are attaching more
and more importance to and which allows differentiation.
Using Bio-PET, brand owners may emphasis their
position and attract attention to their products. For
Seufert comparable “plant based materials, such as PLA,
had one big drawback – price,“ as managing director
Thomas Pfaff explains: “our packaging from Bio-PET is
now available at nearly the same price as transparent
packaging from traditional PET”. Until the end of the
year, the German company has a special offer for those,
who would like to try Bio-PET: CO 2
emissions resulting
from manufacturing of packaging from Bio-PET will be
compensated through the carbon neutral scheme from
natureOffice. For a couple of years, Seufert has been
offering their customers carbon neutral printing in
cooperation with natureOffice. This service will be free of
charge for all users of Bio-PET until end of 2016.
Biobased PET is being transformed into transparent
packaging solutions in the same way as the usual PET
films: offset and screen printing, cutting, stamping
and gluing are managed in house at Seufert’s. Another
advantage – especially compared to other materials
respecting the environment – is that Bio-PET can be
recycled together with conventional PET. MT
www.seufert.com
New certified coffeecapsules
Bonga Red Mountain: Wild coffee from Ethiopian rainforest
project is now available in compostable coffee capsules /
aluminum-free and biobased.
The company Original Food from Freiburg, Germany,
has worked on a solution concerning the challenges of
conventional aluminium capsules and is now prepared to
launch the first certified compostable coffee capsule for the
Nespresso-system.
The capsule is not only aluminum-free and biobased but
also contains one of the best coffees in the world: Bonga Red
Mountain wild coffee from the Ethiopian region of Kaffa.
For over 12 years, Original Food has been marketing this
premium wild coffee as active contribution to the preservation
of the decimated rainforest and has been leading the way in
sustainability.
For this reason, it was only logical for the founder,
Florian Hammerstein, to invest in the development of an
environmental-compatible capsule.
“Premium wild coffee, such as Bonga Red Mountain,
which is not only collected in a rainforest project in Ethiopia
but also traded fair and processed environmentally friendly
does not belong into a regular plastic capsule” argues Florian
Hammerstein, founder and CEO of Original Food. “Even so,
it is our aim to share this unique taste with fans of capsule
machines and that is precisely why we have been researching
for an ideal solution: the compostable coffee capsule.”
With the new Bonga Red Mountain coffee capsule Original
Food advocates a capsule that avoids the growing wastage:
the capsule consists of a specially developed PLA based
bioplastic on the basis of renewable resources such as corn
or sugar cane. For the lid a very compacted paper is used.
In order to increase the aroma preservation, two capsules
are packed in one compostable organic wrapping. Both the
biodegradability of the entire capsule and the bioplastic
wrapping are certified according to European standard DIN
EN 13432. As evidence, the capsule is furthermore authorized
to display the OK-compost sign as well as the Seedling by
European Bioplastics. MT
www.originalfood.de
18 bioplastics MAGAZINE [04/16] Vol. 11