Aquapak products such as Hydropol™ are specially engineered materials that can create a range of packaging products that are specially targeted to solve the problem of ‘single use’ plastic.
They allow users to maintain the primary functionality of their products whilst designing-in end-of-life recyclability, anaerobic digestion or compostability.
We produce stable resin pellets that are converted by our network of manufacturing partners using their existing machinery.
Our polymer pellets can be manufactured into a single-layer plastic film, extrusion coatings, laminations to paper or board and injection mouldings.
There is an ever-growing public reaction against the pollution crisis caused by hydrophobic plastics, which are sitting in our landfills, floating in our oceans, and showing up in our air and even our food.
Aquapak Polymers has developed a broad range of solutions based around Polyvinylalcohol (PVOH) – one single highly functional environmental polymer.
PVOH has been used for many years in a narrow range of applications only because it is notoriously difficult to process using standard plastic extrusion equipment. Aquapak has changed that by developing special formulations of PVOH and a proprietary manufacturing process that create a stable pellet that is suitable to be used in most standard thermoplastic extrusion equipment. Aquapak’s customers can, therefore, create blown film, laminations, coatings or rigid forms of PVOH, without losing the valuable inherent properties of this clever material nor its excellent end of life credentials. This has opened up the opportunity of PVOH to be used, either on its own or in combination with other materials, to access a much broader range of applications in the packaging sector.
Our blend, named Hydropol™ is functional, non-toxic and marine safe that competes with, and could eventually replace all the hard-to-recycle, non-degradable commodity plastics that have overwhelmed our environment for decades. Read more on designing out the single-use plastic problem https://www.aquapakpolymers.com/about-us/designing-out-the-problem-of-single-use-plastic/
Products made from Aquapak’s polymer can be used as a single material or combined with other traditional plastics, bioplastics or paper in a versatile way to produce packaging solutions to replace currently non-recyclable packaging. This highly functional polymer can give the packaging its combination of natural strength, flexibility, and barrier properties to oil, grease and oxygen.
After primary use, they are also capable of being fully recycled, and biodegradable in most modern waste streams. They will not break-down into harmful microplastics in the ocean or on land! This is because they are designed to be water soluble in either hot or warm water and leave just water, carbon dioxide and mineralised biomass.
An example of their use is as a coating for paper and paperboard, providing the functional requirements for some major packaging applications, but also allow them to be fully recycled back into paper in standard paper re-processing plants.
Hydropol™ has a range of other end of life options depending on the application, can be recovered for energy in most modern industrial composting processes such as AD. Significantly, it is hydrophilic (water-loving) and non-toxic in the marine environment and on land.
Aquapak has developed an innovative process of producing high performance plastic pellets that can be used to make a broad number of products with traditional thermoplastic processing equipment, providing multiple end of life options.
Around the world governments, NGO’s and individuals are driving an agenda to change how we consume and recycle plastic.
Aquapak is committed to developing polymers that, thanks to their biodegradability in different environments, can contribute to the protection of ecosystems and natural capital. Our innovations are the result of a circular economy model that has been the foundation of our thinking since inception of the company.
This model is based on:
Aquapak has signed up to the Global Commitment of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation to limit the amount of plastic that reaches our oceans by eliminating plastic pollution at the source. Alongside other signatory organisations including Nike, Google, Philips, Renault and H&M, our aim is to set increasingly ambitious targets to accelerate the transition to a circular economy and to work towards eliminating plastic pollution by publishing data and holding key stakeholders to account.
