Comparative Study of Life Cycle Assessment on Two Flexible Packaging Lamination Processes

Abstract

Recently, the air pollution problem in Northern China has become a social focus, packaging printing industry has been considered as one of the most VOCs contributors among them. In the field of flexible packaging laminations, solventless lamination can effectively reduce VOCs emissions from the source and solve atmospheric pollution. It is a green and environmentally friendly lamination process. In this study, dry lamination process was used as the reference group, two-component solventless adhesives were used as the experimental group, two flexible packaging bags (seeds bag with PE/kraft Paper/AL/PE structure) were produced and their life cycle assessment and carbon footprint comparison were performed using eFootprint software. Through systematic research and analysis by using the popular eFootprint LCA online software, the following main research results were obtained: the results showed that the highest carbon content was 41.75% for paper and 39% for solvent-based adhesive when using a solventless lamination process. In the dry lamination process, the highest carbon content was PE film (40%) and solvent-based adhesive (18%). Taking 4000m2 film as a reference, solvent-based adhesives cost twice as much as solventless adhesives and consume 5 times more power. The solventless lamination technology does not have a liquid waste disposal step. We comprehensively compare its packaging performance, environmental and economic benefits. The results show that solventless laminations produce less VOCs emissions, energy consumption, carbon emissions and thus has higher investment-benefit ratios than dry laminations. Solventless lamination is a green flexible packaging lamination process technology that is very competitive and can indeed reduce emissions from the source and reduce atmospheric pollution.