Aquapak

Striving for a sustainable future

Delivering sustainable solutions for our customer's is hugely important to us. And we're passionate about using our expertise to deliver innovative solutions that can make a difference - helping manufacturers to strive for sustainability while also ensuring the integrity of their brand and product is never compromised.

That’s why we partnered with Aquapak, a leader in polymer technology that offers excellent functionality, recyclability, and environmental credentials.

Together, our teams have been collaborating to deliver a game-changing set of test methods suitable for WVTR (Water Vapor Transmission Rate) for Aquapak’s Hydropol™ biodegradable polymer.

What is Hydropol™?

Hydropol offers all the benefits of traditional polymer plastics. The benefit however is that it is water soluble and completely biodegradable as well as non-toxic and UV resistant. It also offers multiple end-of-life options such as recyclability, compostability, and compatibility with anaerobic digestion plants.

But due to the complicated nature of this material, establishing a reliable and repeatable test method for WVTR is quite the challenge. That’s where we came in.

Our teams put their minds together to provide Aquapak customers across a wide range of sectors with a real alternative to using traditional polymers, helping them cut plastic pollution in the process.

The experiments that took place…

The WVTR test method is a known challenge for hydrophilic polymers, and the team at Aquapak were looking to utilize our knowledge and resource to develop a testing method that could be carried out in-house as well as replicated at customer premises - wherever they happen to be in the world. So, what happened?

Max Phippard, Quality Control Manager at Aquapak shared his thoughts on the project,

“Allowing the WVTR test to reach equilibrium means that we are confident in the results. Over the last few months, we have carried out full analysis of multi-layer samples to gain an understanding of how our customers can replicate their own WVTR testing regime on Hydropol. Being able to build a relationship with Industrial Physics and leverage their expertise in packaging barriers was critical to the success of this programme.”

What are the next steps?

Alan Shema, Product Line Director at Industrial Physics explored what the future may look like when developing solutions for this test method,

“We have reached a point where the WVTR test on Hydropol can be replicated anywhere in the world by using the approach taken by Aquapak and ourselves. This is a major step forward because it will shape how hydrophilic films are tested in future. It allows our global customers who source sustainable packaging materials such as Hydropol to carry out their own WVTR knowing they can trust the results.”

Investing in a sustainable future.

This is just one example of the work our team has been doing to support a more sustainable world. But in order to deliver test and inspection solutions that can make a real impact, we believe it’s important to get a true picture as to the state of play. That’s why earlier this year, we surveyed more than 250 packaging decision makers across a wealth of industries – finding out how sustainable packaging innovations are impacting quality control all over the world.

The responses uncovered insights around testing challenges, supply chain issues, the viability of international test methods, material performance, and much more. You can access our report for free by clicking below!

Access ‘2022 Global Outlook of Sustainable Packaging’ here!

Get in touch

If you have a question regarding a specific test method, or if you have a need for a testing solution, our team will be more than happy to help. Just get in touch with us to speak with one of our experts!