Agfa encourages green printing

Agfa has unveiled a product aimed at encouraging newspapers from across the globe to adopt more environmentally-friendly printing techniques by improving the efficiency of the process, says Earthtone.

The company claims its new VXCF clean-out unit can boost productivity significantly as well as cutting waste by as much as 40% because of the pH neutral gum used in the manufacture of its violet digital plate.

"We have experienced a cost reduction between 20% and 25% using Agfa's chem-free plates," said Paul Huybrechts of Belgian firm Coldset Printing Partners.

The significant upswing in the German machinery industry has only in part reached printing machine makers, meaning there is no cause for more than cautious optimism, an industry group says, reports the Wall Street Journal.

After a significant slump in orders during the economic crisis, orders in the printing and paper technology sector have picked up moderately since the start of the year, the printing and paper equipment and supplies group in the German engineering federation VDMA says.

High cancellation numbers, declining orders and over-capacity particularly hit printing machine makers like Heidelberger Druck, Koenig & Bauer and Manroland.

HP has taken pole position in the digital colour Web printing race at Graph Expo earlier this week, following the unveiling of its colour Web press, the T350, notes Print Week.

The new machine offers print speeds of up to 200 metres per minute, the equivalent of 3 927 letter-size pages, which is 66% faster than the previous T300 model's 122mpm output.

HP's latest addition also trumps Screen's Jet520ZZ offering, also revealed at the show, which outputs at 220 metres per minute but features a narrower 520mm Web width.