Water and alcohol consumption, dampening solution and wastage

If you want to print in a resource-saving - "green" - way, it is hard to avoid waterless offset printing. The differences between conventional and waterless offset printing are shown in the following balance sheet.

Conventional Offset printing: A two-shift B1 offset press consumes approx. 150 litres of fresh water per day and approx. 500 - 600 litres of isopropyl alcohol (IPA) per month. Fountain solutions may have to be disposed of as hazardous waste. The adjustment of the correct ink-water balance - despite all the expertise - sometimes requires a considerable amount of waste sheets during set-up.

Waterless Offset printing: As the name suggests, this printing process uses no water, no fount solution and no IPA. Since no ink-water balance has to be achieved, the presses come into colour much faster. This means less makeready waste, faster job turnaround and economical production of even short runs.

Printing substrates

In fact, waterless offset printing is unrivalled when it comes to the variety of substrates - from paper to plastic to metal. A particular strength lies in the implementation of security features, such as those used for chip cards, ID cards, passports, admission tickets or banknotes.

Offset press

The introduction of or changeover to waterless offset printing is usually carried out on conventional offset presses and is easy to handle.