All the top papermakers are doing it. After Smurfit Kappa and its Thermo Box or Stora Enso and its PureFiber range Iggesund of the Swedish forestry group Holmen is also launching a cellulose product to replace plastic food trays.
The new Inverform board is a bleached homogeneous board (SBB) made of pure cellulose fibre from sustainably managed forests. With its polymer coating, it has been designed for the manufacture of pressed and folded food trays. It does not contain any added optical brighteners and is suitable for microwave and conventional ovens.
Polymer-coated Inverform trays have a much smaller carbon footprint than regular plastic trays and are recyclable in existing recycling plants, according to the papermaker.
"Our aim was to develop a renewable and recyclable material for food trays that is more environmentally friendly than plastic, while maintaining high packaging performance in all parts of the value chain" says Stefan Söderberg. And he points out that the recycling rate for plastic is less than 40 percent.
Inverform is only the first product of a new product application, the papermaker is currently working on the next generation of coatings for more durable packaging.
