PROJECT DESCRIPTION
BACKGROUND
This motivation for the project was that Vertis saw a market opportunity for an innovative packaging, PaperFoam ®, made of natural fibres and starch, which would be both environmental friendly and of high quality. In 1996, Vertis invented the Injection Moulding Technology for producing PaperFoam packaging. This Injection Moulding Technology was expected to be a major breakthrough in the terms of the economies of production and the cost of the biopolymer based foam-packaging, especially when compared to other techniques, such as wafer irons. In fact, this technology originated in the plastics industry, but no one had ever tried previously to use it to make starch based, biodegradable packaging. More recently, the activities of Vertis in this field have been successful in the marketplace, resulting in the establishment of a separate company, PaperFoam BV. PaperFoam BV enables the manufacture of environmentally sustainable packaging which is also commercially attractive. PaperFoam is based solely on renewable resources, such as starch, natural fibre and water. In addition, after use, the material can be recycled with paper. It is biodegradable and it can be burned without damaging the environment. The PaperFoam technology is especially suited to the production of low-quantity, high-quality packaging applications. PaperFoam packaging therefore removes the need to make the tradeoffs necessary with other packaging materials: *cheap high quality but unsustainable plastic, *sustainable but low quality paper pulp, *and sustainable high quality but expensive bioplastics. Present alternative packaging such as EPS ( polystyrene ) and cardboard are far less environmentally friendly due to their origin (EPS ) or their energy intensive manufacturing process (cardboard). PaperFoam on the other hand can be easily disposed of in any conceivable waste-process ( paper recycling, combustion or composting ) due to the fact that it is completely bio-degradable and contains no toxic components. And its process is, compared to corrugated board, very energy extensive, which is mainly due to the fact that the wet paperpulp which is used as base material for corrugated board contains about 5% dry matter, whereas the suspended solution of starch and water, which forms the basis for Paperfoam contains already 50% dry matter. This means that it costs about ten times less energy to reach the requested dry matter percentage if Paperfoam is used as base material instead of corrugated board.
OBJECTIVES
The Paperfoam project was carried out to show the industrial packaging market that the patented ‘injection moulding’ technology is a method that can be easily applied, is very competitive and is also an environmentally friendly alternative which can be used in the production of packaging for food (hamburgers, etc.) and non-food applications (electrical equipment, electronics etc.). The technology is based on the use of recyclable raw materials, such as potato starch, instead of the usual polystyrenes or cardboard. A aim of the project was to build and operate a demonstration plant in order to show the market that, having drawn up the specifications, using this technology in combination with design tools (CAD/CAM) and knowledge of recipes, it was possible to have a continuous production process for all conceivable types of packaging. This demo-plant was meant to: 1. Give Paperfoam a sound economic future by getting commercial orders. Vertis would probably gain from the project, because of the publicity resulting from the dissemination-activities. 2. Achieve a packaging which is qualitatively very good, able to hold a weight of 3 kilograms and/ or moistured products, is (bio)degradable and therefore less damaging to the environment (also because of the lower energy usage in the production process), and contributes to the realisation of the aim of the European Committee to reduce agricultural surpluses, e.g. by means of agrification. It was expected that the Paperfoam-project would contribute to a substantial environmental gain, especially in relation to problems that have a transboundary character and therefore affect the whole European Community.
RESULTS
The Paperfoam technology is a one-step process, based on injection moulding, that has a high level of environmental sustainability: 1. All raw materials are from renewable resources; the process is energy efficient and runs on compact, inexpensive production units. 2. The modular set-up of the production process ensures that only a relatively modest investment is needed to start a Paperfoam production line, instead of the huge capital investment needed for more conventional production facilities. 3. The production capacity can be increased incrementally, by simply adding additional units to the chain as needed. In this way, the risk of costly over-capacity is reduced considerably. The project results were better than expected: 1. Because of the demonstration project carried out within the framework of the LIFE programme, the beneficiary generated orders from five international companies (Bosch, Siemens, Packard, Detewe and Ascom); 2. The amount of interest generated in the product and the technology was huge, as demonstrated by several packaging awards, press releases, articles, phone-calls and e-mails from all over the world; 3. In terms of environmental benefits, the results were as expected. This included a reduced energy requirement of 7,700 MJ and a reduction in CO2 emissions of 340 kg equivalents. As interest in the product was much higher than expected, it was anticipated that by 2005 production would be a factor 900 of the production during the project period. This means that the environmental benefits will be a factor of 900 higher; 4. In terms of job creation, this was much higher than expected: by early 2003 about 30 people were working for Paperfoam. The results achieved were primarily in the non-food sector, as launching customers were found in this sector. A launching customer in the food sector has not yet been found. The beneficiary’s own conclusion is that the results are very promising, even if the market appeared to be more difficult to convince than initially thought. The beneficiary puts it like this: “Not only the product, but also the process of the potential customer must be known, especially where the packaging is handled through the entire process. It was more difficult than assumed beforehand to convince potential buyers of licenses of the commercial advantages of Paperfoam. This is probably related to the conviction that Paperfoam is cheaper when the whole, integral cost-price is considered (while the bare production cost price is higher than other variations of packaging), but can be more expensive in some parts of the whole business-production chain.” Paperfoam B.V. has now acquired the know-how and patents in Paperfoam technology and its applications, products, machinery and the necessary raw materials. Because the technology is new and because the packaging market is critical with respect to the end users acceptance (the packaging gives the first impression of the product), it was necessary to demonstrate that full-scale production is possible whatever the product parameters prescribed by the market segment concerned. Therefore the demo-plant was used to demonstrate that different kinds of packaging could be constructed combining design tools (CAD), the Paperfoam Injection Moulding technique and a knowledge base of recipes based on early years of technology development. During (and after) the project, Vertis and Paperfoam disseminated the results of the project through media such as articles, press releases and a Website. Since October 1999, Paperfoam technology has been used to pack the Tenovis (former Bosch Telecom) line of desktop phones. This application has received several international packaging awards: 1. 2000 WPO Worldstar in the Consumer Electronics category. 2. 1st place in the Deutscher Verpackungswettbewerb 2000, the major German packaging contest. 3. The international Packaging Industry Award 2000 in the UK Environmental Design category. 4. 2nd prize in the Dutch Gouden Noot competition. Paperfoam also obtained two certificates, which declare that all Paperfoam products have a low environmental load and that they are biological degradable. The first is the international DIN-CERTO certificate; the other is a certificate of OWS (Organic Waste Systems). Subsequent to the project, Paperfoam is now not only a technical, but also an increasingly commercial alternative. This conclusion is based on the fact that the beneficiary is capable of producing a broad range of product types with the aid of IM technology, and also by the fact that extensive profiling at exhibitions, in published articles etc. has led to increased interest from potential customers. At the end of the project, the financial figures were also better than expected, as more customer fees have been obtained. Depending on the scale of production and purpose of the Paperfoam packaging, this investment can be earned back in 7 years. It can therefore be concluded that even wothout penetrating the market for food packaging, Paperfoam can become a profitable business. The profit after 7 years is expected to be between EUR 1.4 and EUR 4.5 million. The machinery, moulds and other equipment needed to produce Paperfoam, can easily be transported to or made in other geographic areas. From a technical point of view, it is also possible to produce Paperfoam for packaging-purposes other than modems or telephones, such as for gifts, perfumes, eau de cologne, jewellery etc. Paperfoam plans to continue to develop its technology patent position products and organisation. The company aims to generate a network of licensees, who will use the Paperfoam technology to produce environmentally sustainable packaging materials. An ex-post evaluation carried out by the LIFE external monitoring team in July 2004, showed PaperFoam has continued to flourish: . It has sold 4 licences, one in Malaysia (Penang) and one in Denmark (Torring), one in China (Beijing) and the US (Dallas). . There are approximately 45 machines worldwide of which 30 are licensees. . Since the end of the LIFE project, PaperFoam has also obtained several new customers such as Motorala, Axis, Stabilo, Iomega, SONICblue/Rio. . PaperFoam has won several new awards including the UK Starpack Award 2003 for Consumer Family (classification: Gold), the Ameristar 2003 and the reputed Worldstar 2003 award (in the category ‘electronics’). . The financial results, a crucial indicator for the sustainability of the technology and initiative, are excellent e.g the target for turnover for the 2004 fiscal year looks set to be met. The previous fiscal year also showed strong progress. First profits were expected in Q3 of 2005.
