This machine is efficient and sustainable on small-to-medium production lines

Mondi, a global leader in packaging and paper, has collaborated with Austrian mechanical engineering company EW Technology to launch a new machine for paper pallet wrapping that is more efficient and sustainable on small-to-medium production lines.

The two companies worked together to design the innovative machine, which fills a gap Mondi identified in the pallet wrapping market. The machine can be fully automated to wrap up to 60 pallets every hour or semi-automated to wrap 10-15 pallets in an hour.

The machine takes a full reel of Mondi’s advantage StretchWrap paper, allowing customers to replace the multi-layer plastic, which is currently the industry standard for pallet wrapping. Advantage StretchWrap is 100% virgin paper, created with renewable materials and fully recyclable in existing paper waste streams across Europe. It contains no plastic or coating but still ensures excellent strength and tension absorption. Mondi commissioned an independent life cycle assessment (LCA) comparing the innovative paper pallet packaging to conventional plastic stretch film and proved that it performed better in several impact categories, most notably in climate change, with a 62% lower carbon footprint than virgin plastic stretch film.

From a user’s point of view, there are further benefits. A full reel of Advantage StretchWrap can be applied to the new machine without re-winding. The larger dimensions of the Advantage StretchWrap reel mean that a replacement reel is only needed every 400-600 pallets compared to 40-80 pallets for plastic wrapping, providing a more efficient solution.

Philipp Ertl, a co-founder of EW Technology, says, “Sustainable projects are close to our hearts, and as a young team, we are determined to make a positive contribution to the environment. By taking a collaborative approach with Mondi, we learned exactly what was needed and worked together to deliver a unique new offering in paper wrapping technology for palletized goods, one that will benefit companies across many industries.”

“We worked with brands across various industries and recognized that companies seeking to be more sustainable and with smaller outputs require a customized machine for paper pallet wrapping. This machine will mean that customers can successfully and safely wrap their products in a paper for transportation, work towards a more circular system, and positively contribute to the environment,” says Babicz Bartosz, product manager Advantage StretchWrap, Mondi.

The Covid-19 pandemic led to the country-wide lockdown on 25 March 2020. It will be two years tomorrow as I write this. What have we learned in this time? Maybe the meaning of resilience since small companies like us have had to rely on our resources and the forbearance of our employees as we have struggled to produce our trade platforms.

The print and packaging industries have been fortunate, although the commercial printing industry is still to recover. We have learned more about the digital transformation that affects commercial printing and packaging. Ultimately digital will help print grow in a country where we are still far behind in our paper and print consumption and where digital is a leapfrog technology that will only increase the demand for print in the foreseeable future.

Web analytics show that we now have readership in North America and Europe amongst the 90 countries where our five platforms reach. Our traffic which more than doubled in 2020, has at times gone up by another 50% in 2021. And advertising which had fallen to pieces in 2020 and 2021, has started its return since January 2022.

As the economy approaches real growth with unevenness and shortages a given, we are looking forward to the PrintPack India exhibition in Greater Noida. We are again appointed to produce the Show Daily on all five days of the show from 26 to 30 May 2022.

It is the right time to support our high-impact reporting and authoritative and technical information with some of the best correspondents in the industry. Readers can power Packaging South Asia’s balanced industry journalism and help sustain us by subscribing.

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.