Environmental Management of Photopolymer Flexographic Printing Plates

The defining characteristic of flexographic printing is the flexographic printing plate. Flexographic plates have the printing image in relief, which means the image area is raised relative to the nonimage area. As with any industry, technological evolution has brought changes in flexographic plates. Plates made from light sensitive photopolymers are now being used throughout the industry. Photopolymer plates are similar to traditional rubber plates in that they are flexible and resilient, but their use poses different environmental concerns. In this fact sheet, environmental considerations are described in the use of various photopolymer flexographic plate development processes.Ope