Prospects for water‐based inks and coatings

Some ten years ago, industry world‐wide entered a period of economic shortages and rising prices of petroleum, a situation making it essential for economy to be exercised in the use of organic solvents. This led to an upsurge of interest in water‐based products for use in printing and packaging. Interest was further stimulated by the increasing pressures from health and safety legislation and growing concern about environmental pollution problems. There were possibilities to develop alternative water‐based products to many solvent based inks, varnishes, lacquers and adhesives and quite a number of commercial successes were achieved and sustained. The following recession of the mid 1970's and depressed economic climate of recent years has done little to advance progress in water‐based inks. There were subsequently no major problems in availability of organic solvents and from this aspect no urgent needs to evaluate alternative water‐based products, unless real economic or technical advantages could be demonstrated.