Kodak reckons it will have helped save 265 million litres of water next year as a result of selling printing plates.
The forecast is based on new adoption data for its Sonora process-free plates… and the pumpkins? They’re an example of how variability can be good, according to company blogger and product marketing manager Pam Patterson.
Apparently a display of individually carved and lit pumpkins reminded Patterson that variability can be good. “But for printers, it means excessive quality checks, plate remakes or reprinted jobs, lost business or missed deadlines,” she says.
The argument of course, is that taking processing – “a big source of variability” out of platemaking reduces variability. And of course, water use.
With even water-rich nations such as the USA expecting a water scarcity crisis in 30 per cent of its cities in the next four years and Brazil – the world’s most water-rich nation – facing water supply deficits of more than 80 per cent, that’s an issue.
Worldwide graphics marketing general manager Rich Rindo says water conservation has become a priority that every industry needs to address: “In the print industry, it is our responsibility to save resources where we can and continually consider where we can use technology to best minimise the drain on those resources,” he says.
“Allowing printers to take water use out of the process entirely introduces a new era of sustainability in platemaking. Apart from the chemistry and energy removed from the prepress process, the water savings alone is enough to make printers think twice about the impact they’re having on the environment with their operations.”
With traditional processed plates, water is used to run the plate processor and clean it after production, as well as to run a rinse/gum unit if baking plates. In addition, it is mixed with concentrated processing chemistry. Rindo says that with Kodak’s Sonora plates, this water can be removed from the platemaking process entirely. The technology also holds promise for print operations in emerging industrial centres with limited or no water treatment infrastructure.
“Kodak is seeing rapid growth in Sonora plate adoption, with more than 400 new and converted customers,” he says.
At the same time, Kodak says it has cut water use at manufacturing facilities around the world by almost a quarter since 2009.
A Sonora News process free plate addresses newspaper applications, typically with platesetters such as the automated Generation News CTP system.