For sustainable food packaging, the extrusion coating specialist Metpack, Istanbul, now offers coated paper and paperboard certified home-compostable OK Compost Home from TÜV Austria. Metpack’s paper Ezycompost benefits from a coating with BASF’s ecovio® 70 PS14H6.

The biopolymer is certified home-compostable (OK Compost Home) and adds several functional advantages to paper for food packaging: It is food-contact approved (FDA) and shows excellent barrier properties against liquids, fats, grease, and mineral oil, as well as temperature stability at boiling water (up to 100°C).

This combination of proven compostability and excellent performance gives paper packaging manufacturers and food brands the certainty that food packaging articles made of Ezycompost can be safely used by consumers and create no persistent microplastics in home compost after usage. The new home-compostable solution thus supports the organic recycling of food waste and helps to close the nutrient loop to achieve a circular economy.

There is a big trend in society, in some countries driven by legislation, to move from pure plastic to paper-based packaging, which is unsuitable for many different foods, especially with liquid or fatty ingredients. The new home-compostable, coated paper by Metpack can be used for many food-contact applications like cold/hot cups, pots, and trays for deep-freezing or microwave use. It can be manufactured on standard forming lines, enabling faster coating speeds and a 40% thinner coating than polylactic acid (PLA).

Ecovio® 70 PS14H6 allows coating line speeds comparable to polyethylene (PE). The material shows no adhesion to chill roll, outstanding sealing and printing properties, and can be processed by mono or co-extrusion without adhesives.

“With Ezycompost, we can offer the food industry the best of both worlds when it comes to coated paper packaging”, says Sühan Gürer, Vice President, Sales and New Project Development at Metpack. “It has the same strength as PE-coated paper but with the added benefit that it is certified compostable and creates no persistent microplastics in organic or paper waste streams. Its faster processing and home-compostability are a double advantage compared to PLA coatings, which are only industrially compostable. This enables the food packaging industry to differentiate its products without compromising performance and quality, and reach its sustainability targets.” Metpack’s paper solution is certified up to a grammage of 334 gsm in total composition.

After usage, food packaging made of Ezycompost coated with ecovio® 70 PS14H6 can be composted in garden home compost according to national legislation. Thus, BASF’s home-compostable ecovio® extends the end-of-life options for paper food packaging. “Our ecovio® 70 PS14H6 is also industrial compostable and performs well in paper recycling”, says Michael Bernhard Schick from global marketing Biopolymers at BASF.

“Its home compostability is even certified according to Australian standard AS 5810, the most stringent one in the world. Our biopolymer is available with a bio-based content of between 70 and 80 percent of renewable resources according to ASTM D 6866. Suppose customers want to reduce their Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) even further. In that case, we can also supply a certified biomass-based balanced (BMB) grade: At the beginning of production, its fossil-based feedstock is 100% replaced with waste-based biomass, which is then attributed to the BMB grade and thus has a 25% lower PCF than the standard ecovio® grade.”

The BMB grade has the same properties, performance, machine processability, and biodegradation certificates as the standard ecovio® 70 PS14H6. Due to its excellent migration barrier properties, the BASF biopolymer also enables using recycled paper in food applications.

BASF’s biopolymers enable organic recycling

BASF’s biopolymer ecovio® is certified compostable by standards such as DIN EN 13432. Typical applications for ecovio® are organic waste bags, cling film, fruit and vegetable bags, agricultural mulch films, and food packaging applications. Studies show the advantages of ecovio® for the production, packaging, and shelf life of food and the collection of food waste.

These advantages are based on the material’s certified biodegradability in industrial and home composting as well as in agricultural soil: Food waste is reduced, nutrients are returned to the soil using greater volumes of compost, and the accumulation of persistent microplastics in agricultural soil is avoided. This contributes to a circular economy by closing the nutrient cycle via organic recycling.