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Topics:
Environment
Printing
Trades Collaborate to Reduce Toxics
Design for
Environment Printing Project: Printing Trades Collaborate
to Reduce Toxics. The Design for Environment Printing Project
is a voluntary, cooperative effort between the printing industry
and the EPA to build the capacity of printers themselves to make
responsible and informed choices about how best to protect the
environment of their communities and the health of their workers.
Working collaboratively with EPA staff, printers have identified
priorities, volunteered resources, tested new methods, and communicated
cost- effective alternatives throughout the industry. They are
thus making it easier, especially for smaller shops, to be environmentally
responsible without putting themselves out of business or their
workers out of jobs. Story and case study
plus.
Contents
Story:
Printing Trades Collaborate to Reduce Toxics
Case Study Plus: Design for Environment
Catalyzes Partnerships to Reduce Toxics in Printing Trades
Story:
Printing Trades Collaborate to Reduce Toxics
Story
prepared by Henry Topper and Carmen Sirianni, CPN editors.
The Design
for Environment Printing Project is a voluntary, cooperative effort
between the printing industry and the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency to build the capacity of printers themselves to make responsible
and informed choices about how best to protect the environment
of their communities and the health of their workers. The adversarial
strategy leaves printers simply reacting to the latest environmental
regulations, and is ineffective in addressing what is probably
the industry's biggest negative impact on the environment, namely,
the combined effect of the many small printers in an area. The
cooperative approach is designed to put them ahead of the regulatory
curve, and to provide the information and social networks needed
to make continuous improvements that are both responsible and
cost effective.
Printers
themselves identified a chemical application, blanket washing,
that they felt presented serious concerns in the workplace and
the environment. Volunteers joined a coordinating group with EPA
staff from the Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics, and
began to mobilize their own assets to develop and test alternatives,
and to communicate this information throughout the industry.
Almost all
sectors of the industry have made contributions. Suppliers have
donated their products for comparative evaluation, and shops volunteered
to use alternative blanket washes, and to carefully record their
experiences with the help of a consultant. Staff from the printing
trade associations, both national and local, are actively involved,
and the Graphic Arts Technical Foundation is performing lab tests
and screening alternative blanket washes. Printers around the
country have met in focus groups to give advice on the direction
of the project, and to define how best to communicate the results
to printers. EPA staff are helping with the technical review and
other aspects of the project, and will develop with the printers
the kind of information on comparative risks, exposures, performance,
and the costs of alternatives that will permit informed and responsible
choices by printers themselves. And the trade press has agreed
to publicize the results to printers across the nation.
This approach
treats printers not as potential lawbreakers in need of tutoring
and regulation from above. It treats them with the dignity of
citizens capable of collaborating with each other and with government
in defining a responsible environmental agenda, and carrying it
out with the assets that they themselves can mobilize: their knowledge
and skill as workers and managers, their commitments to a sustainable
environment in their communities, and to their own health and
well being. The process builds trust, and the networks capable
of continuous learning and improvement as they move to define
further areas of environmental concern. And the cooperative effort
to produce essential environmental information levels the playing
field in the industry by making information available to printshops
of all sizes, and thus allows small shops to remain competitive
while making more environmentally sound choices.
More
information
Henry Topper
Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics
Washington, DC 20460
Phone: 202-260-6750
fax: 202-260-2219
Stu McMichael
Custom Print
703-979-6670.
Marci Kinter
Environmental Affairs Officer
Screen Printers Association International
703-359-1314.
Case
Study Plus: Design for Environment Catalyzes Partnerships to Reduce
Toxics in Printing Trades
Case
study provided by Henry Topper, Office of Pollution Prevention
and Toxics. Henry Topper is also on the CPN Environment editorial
team.
1)
Chemical Alternatives for Screen Reclamation
The Design
for the Environment (DfE) Screen Printing Project is a unique,
cooperative effort between the screen printing industry and the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) dedicated to helping
screen printers improve their efforts to protect the environment.
Improving environmental performance means using new procedures,
products, and equipment to do the same job with less hazard to
both workers and the environment. Industry participants in the
DfE Screen Printing Project stress that understanding the possible
environmental benefits of alternative products should be an early
step in evaluating any changes to current work practices. One
goal of the project is to provide printers with chemical risk
and pollution prevention information, along with performance and
cost information, so that they are better equipped to incorporate
environmental concerns into day-to-day business decisions.
Printers,
EPA, product manufacturers, and the screen printing trade association
are all concerned with minimizing the environmental and health
hazards of screen reclamation chemicals currently used in printing
shops. In response to these concerns, the DfE Screen Printing
Project worked with printers and selected the screen reclamation
process as the project's focus. Through DfE, these groups worked
together to evaluate alternative screen reclamation products.
A total of eleven alternative chemical "systems" were evaluated.
Most "systems" included an ink remover, an emulsion remover, and
a haze remover.
This is
the third in a series of case studies developed by EPA to illustrate
how industry and the EPA can work together to investigate ways
to improve environmental performance in the screen printing industry.
Specifically, this case study is geared towards getting information
to small- or medium-sized printers like you. As you think about
changing to environmentally improved products in your shop, these
case studies can help you sort through some of the different factors
that can make one product a more attractive substitute than another.
This case study highlights one of the alternative systems demonstrated
in the DfE project, describing:
- Performance
evaluations of the alternative system from laboratory tests
and from two volunteer printing facilities;
- The health
and environmental risks of the alternative system compared to
a traditional screen reclamation system;
- The cost
of the alternative system compared to the cost of a traditional
system.
Background
Initiated
by industry, this project was entirely voluntary and involved
almost all sectors of the screen printing industry: manufacturers
donated their products for evaluation, staff from Screenprinting
and Graphic Imaging Association International (SGIA) coordinated
the field demonstrations, the Screen Printing Technical Foundation
(SPTF) performed initial product testing, printers nationwide
evaluated the products in their facilities, and EPA staff conducted
the risk assessment of the products. One advantage of this coordinated
effort is that all product systems were evaluated using the same
methods. The consistency of the evaluations allows you to compare
the results to determine which of the alternatives may be a viable
substitute for your current reclamation products.
This case
study highlights one alternative system, referred to as Alternative
System "Epsilon." This system, as with all systems demonstrated
in this project, is a real, commercially available screen reclamation
system; however, "Epsilon" is a masked name. The actual trade
name for this alternative system (or for any of the alternative
systems demonstrated) is not used in this case study or in the
final project report. Trade names were masked for several reasons:
- One of
the goals of the DfE project is to illustrate the process of
searching for and evaluating cleaner alternatives. DfE hopes
to encourage you to incorporate environmental concerns in your
facility's decision-making processes and into your discussions
with suppliers. By masking trade names, DfE encourages you to
discuss the characteristics of the products you use, or are
considering using, with your suppliers. This case study and
the DfE project help you to know what characteristics to look
for in the screen reclamation products you purchase.
- Since
every screen printing shop is different, manufacturers recognize
that their product's performance may vary greatly depending
on both the operating conditions and the varying opinions of
the different printers using the products. In order to get their
full cooperation before the results were available, some manufacturers
asked that the product names be masked.
To compare
the cost and risk of Alternative System Epsilon to a known system,
a baseline was established using a traditional solvent-based screen
reclamation system. The traditional system used in the comparison
consists of lacquer thinner as the ink remover, a sodium periodate
solution as the emulsion remover, and a xylene/acetone/mineral
spirits/cyclohexanone blend as the haze remover. These chemicals
were selected because screen printers indicated they were commonly
used in screen reclamation. In both the cost and risk comparisons,
it was assumed that these chemicals were applied manually to 6
screens per day, each 2,127 in2 (approximately 15 ft2) in size.
Promising
Performance
Performance
was evaluated in two phases: 1. performance demonstrations at
SPTF's laboratory evaluated the products under controlled conditions;
and 2. field demonstrations at volunteer printers' facilities
provided performance information under the variable conditions
of production. Since conditions vary greatly, printers felt it
would be most valuable to evaluate performance based on the experiences
and opinions of the experts: the people who used the alternative
products in their facilities during the month-long demonstrations.
Each product system was demonstrated in two or three facilities
to get a more complete evaluation of performance under a variety
of operating conditions.
Laboratory
Testing
During laboratory
testing, three imaged screens were reclaimed using Alternative
System Epsilon: one that had been inked with a solvent-based ink,
the second with an ultraviolet-curable (UV) ink, and the third
with a water-based ink. Following the ink application, screens
were allowed to dry for 15 minutes to simulate a shop situation.
After drying, the ink remover was applied according to the manufacturer's
instructions. Again the screen was allowed to sit, this time for
24 hours, before applying the emulsion and haze removers.
In the lab,
the Epsilon ink remover dissolved the ink quickly, was easy to
use, and rinsed clean of residue on the screens with solvent-based
ink and UV-curable ink. In both cases, a light to moderate ink
stain remained on the screen. When the ink remover was used on
the screen with water-based ink, more time and effort were needed,
but the ink was removed except for a light stain. On all three
screens, the emulsion remover dissolved the stencil and there
was no emulsion residue on any of the screens after pressure rinsing.
In the final step, the Alternative System Epsilon haze remover
lightened the ink stains on all three screens.
On-site
Demonstrations
Two different
facilities used System Epsilon for a month to evaluate how well
it performed in a production situation. The participating facilities
recorded the amount of product used, the length of time needed,
and their opinion of how well the product reclaimed the screen.
Both facilities (referred to in this case study as Facility A
and Facility B) found the product system worked well, especially
the emulsion remover.
- Ink Remover
Performance: At Facility A, the ink remover worked well, although
some of the workers who used it thought that it acted more slowly
and required more effort on catalyzed inks than on other solvent-based
inks. At Facility B, the ink remover removed both UV-curable
and solvent-based inks efficiently , but the UV-curable ink
was slightly easier to clean than the solvent-based ink. In
addition, Facility B found they used significantly less alternative
ink remover per screen than their standard product, which was
lacquer thinner. Emulsion Remover Performance: The emulsion
remover worked well at both facilities, dissolving the stencil
quickly and easily.
- Haze
Remover Performance: Both facilities evaluated the haze remover
performance as "acceptable," and similar in efficacy to their
standard haze removers.
Overall
Evaluation: The performance of Alternative System Epsilon was
similar at both facilities, according to the printers' evaluations.
Because the two facilities have very different operations, the
fact that System Epsilon performed well at both plants demonstrates
that this system can work well under a variety of operating conditions.
Facility A prints banners and point-of-purchase displays on plastic
using a variety of solvent-based inks, a dual cure emulsion, and
mesh counts of 83 - 280 threads/inch. Facility B prints vinyl
and mylar labels using both solvent-based and UV-curable inks.
They use a direct photo stencil and screens with a mesh count
of 355 threads/inch. Even with these differences, Alternative
System Epsilon was successful in reclaiming screens at both facilities.
The final proof for the participating printers was that all the
reclaimed screens could be reused for future print jobs.
Reduced
Risk
Environmental
releases and occupational risks associated with using Alternative
System Epsilon for screen reclamation were evaluated. See the
table for a detailed description of the health risks of both Alternative
System Epsilon and the traditional system.
Whether
using traditional screen reclamation chemicals or an alternative
system, chemicals can get into your body either through your skin
when you contact the product or through your lungs when you breathe
in the chemical vapors. Some chemicals have a lower tendency to
evaporate or to enter the body through the skin; and different
chemicals have different effects, some more harmful than others,
once in your body. The risks associated with inhaling the chemicals
in Alternative System Epsilon are much lower than those of the
traditional system. With the traditional system, daily inhalation
of toluene and methyl ethyl ketone in the ink remover, as well
as acetone in the haze remover could lead to harmful health effects,
because they evaporate readily.
Applying
either the Alternative System Epsilon or the traditional system
products regularly without wearing gloves can be harmful to your
health. These harmful effects through skin contact are attributed
to chemicals in the alternative ink remover and emulsion remover,
as well as to chemicals in all the products of the traditional
system (ink remover, emulsion remover, and haze remover). If you
wear gloves regularly, however, these risks are negligible.
Minimal
Environmental Releases
Based on
the EPA assessment, none of the chemicals in either the traditional
system or Alternative System Epsilon were found to be hazardous
to the environment in the quantities used for screen reclamation,
even when considering the combined releases to water from several
printers in one area. Air releases from facilities using traditional
or alterative chemicals were also evaluated for their effects
on the general population and were found to have no significant
impact.
Cost
Savings
The demonstrations
showed that both of the participating facilities could reduce
their costs for screen reclamation by switching from the traditional
system to Alternative System Epsilon. As with the risk comparisons,
costs of Alternative System Epsilon were compared to the costs
of using the traditional system. The cost estimate for each reclamation
system included labor time spent to reclaim the screen, the cost
of an average quantity of reclamation products, and the cost of
hazardous waste disposal for RCRA-listed chemicals.
For Facility
A, their reclamation cost per screen would drop from $6.27/screen
to $3.08/screen. This would lead to annual savings of $4,775.
At Facility B, the reclamation cost of $6.27/screen using the
traditional system would decrease to $5.29/screen for the alternative
system. Over a year, the savings would amount to $1,469. The difference
in costs between the facilities is due to differences in the quantity
of product used and the labor time required per screen as recorded
by the employees.
The
Design for the Environment Approach
The EPA's
Design for the Environment Program encourages you to systematically
evaluate your facility's technologies, practices, and procedures
and how they might affect your employees' health and the environment.
Our goal in working with screen printers is to help you to make
more informed choices, now and in the future, by catalyzing the
search for and evaluation of cleaner alternatives. With this case
study and others like it, we hope to illustrate the application
of this goal and the pursuit of continuous environmental improvements.
Although
the alternative system described in this case study proved to
be a viable alternative in the two printing facilities where performance
demonstrations were conducted, it may not be the solution for
all types of screen printing operations. If you find that Alternative
System Epsilon does not seem like a feasible substitute for your
facility, refer to the summary of the project's full technical
report, called the Cleaner Technologies Substitutes Assessment
(CTSA), which includes information on all the alternative product
systems and alternative technologies evaluated. When you identify
a product system that seems like a possible substitute for your
facility, contact your supplier to discuss the characteristics
of the products you are looking for.
To obtain
other case studies or a summary of the Screen Printing CTSA, contact:
U.S. EPA
National Center for Environmental Publications and Information
(NCEPI)
P.O. Box 42419
Cincinnati, OH 45242-2419
Fax: 513-891-6685
For trade
association information, contact:
Screenprinting
and Graphic Imaging Association International
10015 Main Street
Fairfax, VA 22031
Phone: 703-385-1335
For more
information about EPA's Design for the Environment Program contact:
Pollution
Prevention Information Clearinghouse (PPIC)
U.S. EPA
410 M Street, SW (3404)
Washington, DC 20460
Phone: 202-260-1023
FAX: 202-260-0178
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