Overview of the market situation of water-based inks at home and abroad

Domestic waterborne ink production development status

As early as the 1960s, people started the research and application of water-based inks. Due to environmental protection requirements and the shortage of petroleum raw materials, some developed countries have gradually banned the use of petroleum products for the manufacture of printing inks. As a result, people started to study non-organic solvent-based inks, making water-based inks have made great progress and development. Initially, water-based inks mainly used binders such as dextrin, shellac, casein, and sodium natrium as water-based inks. The prepared aqueous ink is mainly used for printing some low-grade products.

By the end of the 1960s, with the development of materials science, the synthetic technology of rosin and maleic acid modified resins succeeded, replacing casein, shellac and other materials, becoming the main material of water-based inks, and basically meeting the printing needs at that time. However, these primary products still have some drawbacks, such as poor gloss, poor water resistance, poor adhesion and foaming, and poor storage stability. Later, people called the water-based ink produced at this stage the first-generation product.

In the 1970s, due to the oil crisis, raw materials for inks were once again very tense. At the same time, the governments of various developed countries have legislation to control air quality and limit the emission of organic volatiles (VOC) to the atmosphere. They have strict requirements for food, beverages, and pharmaceuticals. Packaging and printing products (heavy metals, residual volume, etc.) are packaged. Ink research and development personnel from various countries have continued to conduct in-depth research to produce a solution-based styrene-acrylic copolymer resin as the second generation of water-based ink connection material, and on the basis of the introduction of acrylic monomers and styrene polymerization, developed a This kind of polymer emulsion resin has a core-shell structure and a network structure. This series of resins has greatly improved the gloss and dryness of the ink, promoted the development of water-based inks, and enabled the competition between water-based inks and solvent-based inks to broaden the application fields. Water-based ink has entered a new period of development.

Although water-based inks have undergone the upgrading of three generations of products, they have been widely applied and developed in some developed countries. However, the application of water-based inks in China is not very popular, and there is still a certain gap compared with developed countries. In Europe and the United States, water-based inks used in the packaging industry account for 80% of the total package printing. However, our country only accounts for about 7%. In China, water-based inks are mainly used for flexographic printing, and the printing materials are mainly absorbent materials such as paper. In recent years, with the rapid development of the packaging industry, especially the wide application of photosensitive resin plates and laser ceramic anilox rollers, the development of flexographic printing has accelerated, and at the same time it has also led to the rapid development of flexographic inks.

In recent years, flexo printing has been rapidly developed around the world, especially its obvious advantages in improving the environment, etc. In the developed countries of Europe and the United States, it is considered as “the best and most promising printing method on the planet.” For example, 95% of flexographic prints use ink and 80% of gravure prints use ink. At present, there are about 230 flexible machines in the country, which are calculated with 10 tons of ink per year, with a total usage of 2300-2500 tons. The ink consumption of the gravure printing press has exceeded the amount of solvent ink, reaching 3,000 tons, and the amount of ink used in the flexographic carton machine exceeds 10,000 tons. The total national ink consumption is about 15,000 to 16,000 tons per year, plus the widespread use of ink in the packaging and printing of corrugated cartons, which has considerable market potential.

According to relevant statistics, each province in China has an average size of more than 1,000 cartons. If 10% of water-based inks are used to print high-grade cartons, each household uses 10 tons of ink, and each province needs 2,000 tons of water-based ink per year. Excluding other printing and packaging products for flexo and gravure printing (currently, 100% of domestic flexographic printing uses water-based ink, and 80% of gravure printing uses water-based ink).

It should be pointed out that at present, whether it is imported water-based inks or domestic water-based inks, there are disadvantages such as non-alkaline resistance, non-anti-ethanol resistance, water resistance resistance, slow drying, poor glossiness, and easy to cause paper shrinkage. These drawbacks must be overcome. Some use flexible UV inks, which not only increase the printing process, but also increase the printing cost; some use high-priced imported high-grade water-based inks, which also increases the printing cost. All these have caused China's flexographic printing to be restricted, which has restricted the development of China's packaging and printing industry.

Looking forward to the development of water-based ink in China, with the continuous development of the packaging industry and social progress, according to experts predict that by 2010 China's water-based ink will account for 25-30% of the total ink consumption, in which flexographic printing will reach in the field of printing About 15% of the annual demand for water-based ink more than 100,000 tons. With the gradual implementation of China's ISO14000 environmental management system, the development prospect of water-based ink will be incalculable. It is reported that water-based inks are the only non-toxic inks that have been approved by the US Food and Drug Association for all printing inks. Non-toxic and pollution-free environment-friendly water-based inks will gradually replace solvent-based inks in the near future. Therefore, it is imperative to vigorously develop, develop, and produce high-grade water-based inks with great market potential.

The status of water-based ink coating market in key foreign countries

Developed countries have gradually replaced traditional solvent-based inks with water-based inks since the 1970s. In the United States and some European countries, the use of solvent-based inks containing benzene has been banned and green inks have been replaced. In the United States alone, at present, in the U.S. market, at present, 40% of U.S. plastic printing uses water-based ink, and the sales of ink and wash ink are more than double the sales of solvent-based ink, which means that ink has become the main printing product. Use ink. Other developed countries, such as Japan, Germany, France, etc., are also increasingly using water-based inks in plastic film printing. The United Kingdom has already banned the use of solvent-based inks to print films for food packaging.

Water-based inks have undergone improvements that have had a major impact on many areas of the printing industry, especially flexographic printing. It is foreseeable that ink painting will continue to grow. The future development of ink painting depends on the guidance of the EPA (the U.S. Environmental Protectibn Agency); depends on the printer's existing incineration, absorption, and disposal control equipment depreciation and whether it will turn to water-based printing; depends on ink manufacturers to further improve ink performance With a view to gaining more market share.

Source of information: pack.cn