Waste and guilt

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Guilt is a powerful driver for improving environmental impacts and recycling in particular. The paper industry has done a great job in teaching consumers that paper should not be thrown away, because it can be recycled. They have also done a great job in teaching people that resources … Read more

Printing Plates Progress

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner As digital printing keeps up its steady march across the graphics landscape, it’s easy to forget about progress in conventional print. In addition to improvements in makeready times and energy efficiency on press, great strides have been made with consumables, especially printing plate technologies. Most attention gets paid … Read more

FESPA & Green

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner The Fespa show in Hamburg last week brought together a huge lineup of players. They came from all parts of the sign and display business, including digital wide format and screen printing technology providers and users. The textile printing system makers and buyers were also out in force, … Read more

Eco Labels

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Last time we checked there were almost five hundred different eco labels around the world. Most of them applied to food and coffee, or soil or some such. But a handful, such as the Nordic Swan, apply to any type of business, including the graphics industry. The Nordic … Read more

Ignorance and Bamboo

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner It’s not unusual to encounter examples of environmental ignorance or to hear alarming comments from people who should know better. We experienced both in a recent meeting whilst discussing the need for environmental standards in the graphics industry. We were told in no uncertain terms that environmental science … Read more

What happens to dead IT?

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner We all know what happens to printed paper when it’s sent off for recycling. It either gets burnt or sent for processing into new materials, but when old computers reach end of life, matters are less simple.  Reducing the amount of electronic and electrical material that ends up … Read more

250th Verdigris blog!

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Wow. Hard to get the noggin around the fact that this is the 250th Verdigris environmental blog we’ve written. Over the last five years or so we have covered all manner of environmental matters relevant to the graphics industry. But has it made any difference to the market’s … Read more

A Long Green View

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner Taking the long view can be difficult in business, but it’s especially hard when it comes to sustainability. It’s tempting to look only at one’s own interests, especially for the small and medium sized businesses that make up the bulk of the graphics industry. Most of us are … Read more

The Snap, Crackle and Pop of Flexible Packaging

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner It is one of the most useful and yet annoying forms of packaging we have. Its useful because it works with all sorts of content types, from clothing to soup. But it’s annoying because most people are confused as to whether a particular piece of flexible plastic packaging … Read more

Case Getting Louder for ISO 21331

The weekly Verdigris blog by Laurel Brunner We’ve recently been working a lot on ISO 21331, the international standard for assessing the potential deinkability of print. This document is one of several standards under development within ISO to improve the environmental impact and accountability of graphics technology and print.  The idea behind ISO 21331 is … Read more