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Some ten years ago, industry world‐wide entered a period of economic shortages and rising prices of petroleum, a situation making it essential for economy to be exercised in the use of organic solvents. This led to an upsurge of interest in water‐based products for use in printing and packaging. Interest was further stimulated by the increasing pressures from health and safety legislation and growing concern about environmental pollution problems. There were possibilities to develop alternative water‐based products to many solvent based inks, varnishes, lacquers and adhesives and quite a number of commercial successes were achieved and sustained. The following recession of the mid 1970's and depressed economic climate of recent years has done little to advance progress in water‐based inks. There were subsequently no major problems in availability of organic solvents and from this aspect no urgent needs to evaluate alternative water‐based products, unless real economic or technical advantages could be demonstrated.

The trend towards a greater use of water as the solvent in flexographic and gravure printing inks has been influenced by a number of factors — the growing attention to environmental pollution problems, health and safety aspects, elimination of residual print odour in food packaging printing and conservation of organic solvents.

In Graz, Austria, the European Rotogravure Association (ERA) held a conference where several companies presented new developments in the printing industry including the latest developments in the field of water‐based ink systems. This paper discusses water‐based inks for gravure printing.

The purpose of this paper is to prepare, characterise and evaluate nano-emulsions of copolymers of various compositions as eco-friendly binders for flexographic ink industry.

Various nano-emulsions of copolymers were prepared using styrene (St), butyl acrylate (BuAc), acrylic acid (AA) and acrylamide (AAm) monomers by means of a conventional seeded emulsion polymerisation technique, using K2S2O8 as the initiator. The characterisation of the prepared emulsions was performed using Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), gel permeation chromatography (GPC) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). A selection of copolymers was formulated with pigments and additional ingredients, as water-based flexographic inks. The inks were characterised for their viscosity, pH, degree of dispersion, water resistance and colour density.

It was found that the low viscosity of the prepared copolymers may reduce the film thickness of the flexographic inks and may also increase the spreading of the ink on the surface. As a result, stable modified polyacrylate-based latex with improved physico-mechanical properties were obtained. The prepared latexes were showed improving and enhancing in water resistance; gloss values, and the print density that ranged from 2.06 to 2.51 and the maximum gloss values (39 and 48) were also obtained. Also, these binders provide excellent adhesion properties for both the pigment particles and the base paper.

This study focuses on the preparation of new water-based copolymer nanoparticles and their use as eco-friendly binders for flexographic ink industry.

The ink formulations developed could find use in industrial-scale printing.

Eco-friendly environment ink formulations for printing on paper substrates are novel.

The purpose of this study is to prepare, characterise and evaluate nano-emulsions of ter-polymers of various compositions as eco-friendly binders for flexographic ink industry.

Various nano-emulsions of ter-polymers were prepared based on Vinyl acetate, Vinyl Versatate, butyl acrylate, acrylic acid and acrylamide monomers by means of a conventional seeded emulsion polymerisation technique, using K₂S₂O₈ as the initiator. The characterisation of the prepared emulsions was performed using Fourier transform infrared, thermo-gravimetric analysis, gel permeation chromatography and transmission electron microscopy. A selection of co-polymers and ter-polymers were formulated with pigments and additional ingredients, as water-based flexographic inks. The inks were characterised for their rheological properties, pH, degree of dispersion, water-resistance and colour density.

It was found that the low viscosity of the prepared polymers may reduce the film thickness of the flexographic inks and may also increase the spreading of the ink on the surface. As a result, stable modified poly acrylate-based latex with improved physico-mechanical properties was obtained. The prepared latexes showed improved properties such as enhanced thermal stability and better water resistance. The effect of the emulsifier type on the properties of the resulting emulsion latexes and their corresponding films were investigated. Also, as the hydrophobic monomer increases, so does the colour density and increasing the binder ratio enhances the gloss values. The improving in gloss values were obtained and provide excellent adhesion properties for both the pigment particles and the base paper.

The study focusses on the preparation of new water-based ter-polymer nano-particles and their use as eco-friendly binders for flexographic ink industry. Ink formulations based on other different type emulsion polymers could also be studied to assess the applicability of the ink formulation system found for other binders.

The ink formulations developed could find use in industrial-scale printing.

Eco-friendly environment and low-cost ink formulations for printing on paper substrates are novel.

The main developments in the metallic inks market are currently focused on the need to reduce volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the ink formulation, responding to existing and future legislation. Two of the most recent successes in the move away from solvents are water‐based metallic inks and UV (ultra violet) curing metallic inks. Both products, because of their metallic content, have inherent problems associated with their successful manufacture, which must be overcome if the products are to be accepted as viable replacements for traditional solvent‐based formulations.

Environmental, economic and market pressures have led to a dramatic increase in the production of recycled paper fibre in recent years and the growing demand for higher quality grades is now focusing attention on the recycling of office wastes. Although the role of chemistry in the recycling process for paper is well established, the introduction of newer inks and adhesives into the recycling chain has added to the existing problems of “getting the chemistry right”. This article examines the impact on the deinking of secondary paper fibre resulting from evolving ink technologies, catalysed by developments in the printing processes.

The transformation of Manders plc from a paints, property and printing inks company to a leading world player in printing inks began in January 1994 when it sold its decorative paints business to Johnstone's Paints plc (part of the Total group) for £52 million. It then acquired the inks and coatings business from Croda for £27 million and sold Croda its industrial coatings business. This deal included the new state‐of‐the‐art water‐based liquid ink plant in Winschoten, The Netherlands. In June 1994 this was followed by the £38 million purchase of Premier Inks in 's‐Gravenzande and Deurne, The Netherlands. The result has been to make Manders plc the fastest growing ‘ink company in the world, according to chief executive Roger Akers, and Manders Premier the European market leader in the technology, of heatset inks. Pigment & Resin Technology's technical editor, John Bean, recently visited the 's‐Gravenzande factory and R&D centre to bring back this report.