Aquapak is aiming to make its Hydropol material mainstream for polymer extruders to boost circularity.

The PVH functionality of Hydropol is a high-performance polymer, and when extrusion coated or laminated onto paper, it adds strength and barriers to oxygen, oil and grease.

Mark Lapping, chief executive, told Packaging News there were no barrier protection concerns as Hydropol is ‘an excellent’ gas, oil, fat and grease barrier material.

“Hydropol offers or enhances all of the barrier requirements in current multi film structures but importantly adds recyclability and compostability depending on requirements.”

Aquapak has partnered with a base of clients in barrier food packaging, logistics packaging, apparel, fashion, hospitality, healthcare, industrial, nonwovens, and other packaging.

It recently partnered with DS Smith to jointly commission a study which showed that new barrier technologies such as Hydropol provide an alternative to conventional plastic coatings used in paper packaging by promoting improved paper fibre separation and removing plastic waste from the recycling process, reducing the negative impact of paper packaging on the environment.

Aquapak said it has invested £10m in plant and equipment in Birmingham to create capacity of over 10,000 metric tonnes of Hydropol resin pellets. This will increase to 40,000-50,000 metric tonnes over the next three to four years.

Lapping said: “We’re working closely with a number of other biopolymer companies to combine our materials. PVH Flake is already known material on the market. We combine it into multiple different sources.

“We have just announced a collaboration with TIPA, a global leader in compostable packaging solutions for food and goods, to jointly develop unique new compostable barrier materials for film and paper, which will take sustainable packaging to a new level and mitigate the use of conventional plastic.”

Lapping said Aquapak is growing every quarter: “We are doubling our turnover on an annual basis.

There’s a pipeline of development, which is where we see the future growth based around the technology that you see, which is the functionality of the polymer, the processability of the polymer, the barrier films on paper with bio-polymers and bio hybrids.

He said he expected various new materials to enter the market: “Our plan is to be one of those, but we’re not saying we’re a silver bullet. We’re saying we want to work with original polymers, conventional materials like paper and biomaterials, basically, because it’s all about collaboration and combination of different materials.

Plans for 2023 are to focus on scaling up resin production applications – barrier film, coated paper, combining Hydropol with bio-based products.

Lapping said: “We have an exciting new product development pipeline and are working with a number of brands. Lets design it right form the offset.”

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