Kennesaw, Ga. - Taking a holistic approach, Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) is considering its environmental activities on avoiding and reducing CO2, other emissions, and process waste. A newly published brochure, "Solutions for Environmentally Friendly Printing Processes," provides a comprehensive overview of the company's endeavors in this area, taking a close look into prepress, press and postpress processes. The brochure also deals with the wide range of consumables and services available to Heidelberg customers. The Prinect print shop workflow makes an important contribution to environmental protection, too, because transparent and functional processes create the basis for effective environmental protection in practical applications.

The brochure identifies appropriate measures for all three areas and provides good examples of how to reduce annual paper and energy consumption and CO2 emissions:

Reducing paper waste is the best way of cutting CO2 emissions, followed by lowering the energy consumption. For example, using a Speedmaster SM 52 with Anicolor inking unit technology cuts paper waste by up to 90 percent, which is equivalent to 13.2 metric tons of paper or 15.7 metric tons of CO2 a year. The software components in the Prinect workflow enable the introduction of standardized processes that cut down on several hundred metric tons of paper waste and CO2 emissions a year.

The environmental brochure also uses specific examples to demonstrate how Heidelberg machines are among the most energy efficient on the market, be it in prepress with the Suprasetter A52/A75, which offers the lowest energy consumption in its class, or in postpress with Eurobind Pro and its innovative, energy-saving standby functions. Heidelberg is the only manufacturer that tailors its dryers at the product development stage to the press and paper travel requirements, thereby delivering unique energy efficiency for the energy-intensive drying process.

Cutting emissions not only makes an important contribution to the health of employees - it is also an important tool for environmental protection. For example, the PowderStar AP 500 powder spray device cuts powder consumption and reduces the number of wash-up processes required in the press. Alcohol-reduced and alcohol-free printing can be achieved with CombiStar Pro and FilterStar. This measure also has a significant impact on the environment, because every percent less alcohol used can cut annual alcohol consumption by up to 1,200 liters.

Reducing and avoiding process-related waste also makes an important contribution to environmental protection. For instance, Saphira Chemfree printing plates enable plate production entirely without the use of developers and regeneration agents, which saves 350,000 liters of water, 3,100 kWh of energy, and 1.77 metric tons of CO2 per year.