Sustainability and performance benefits are helping to drive interest in UV, UV LED and EB technologies.
Energy curable technologies – UV, UV LED and EB – are a growth area in numerous applications worldwide. This is certainly the case in Europe as well, as RadTech Europe reports that the market for energy curing is expanding. David Engberg or Perstorp SE, who serves as marketing chair for RadTech Europe, reported that the market for UV, UV LED and EB technologies in Europe is generally good, with improved sustainability a key benefit.
“The main markets in Europe are wood coatings and graphic arts,” Engberg said. “Wood coatings, especially furniture, have suffered from a weaker demand end of last year and beginning of this year but seem to be on a more positive development now. Also there is still a trend of converting from traditional solvent borne technologies to radiation curing for increased sustainability as radiation curing both has very low VOC (no solvents) and low energy for curing as well as very good performance (good mechanical properties combined with high production speed).”
In particular, Engberg is seeing greater growth in UV LED curing in Europe.
“LED is increasing in popularity due to lower energy use, as energy costs were exceptionally high in Europe last year, and regulatory as mercury lights are being phased out,” Engberg observed.
It’s interesting that energy curing has found a home in a wide variety of areas, from coatings and inks to 3D printing and more.
“Wood coating and graphic arts are still dominating,” Engberg noted. “Some segments that are small but show high growth are additive manufacturing (3D printing) and inkjet (digital) printing.”
There is still room for growth, but energy curing still has some challenges to overcome. Engberg said that one of the greatest challenges is associated with regulatory.
“Stricter regulations and classifications of raw materials continuously reduces the available raw materials, making it more challenging and expensive to produce safe and sustainable inks, coatings and adhesives,” Engberg added. “The leading suppliers are all working on developing new resins and formulations, which will be key for the technology to continue to grow.”
All things considered, RadTech Europe sees a bright future ahead for energy curing.
“Driven by the excellent performance and sustainability profile, the technology will continue to grow and more segments are discovering the benefits of radiation curing,” Engberg concluded. “One of the latest segments is coil coating that are now very seriously working on how to utilize radiation curing in their production lines.”
Post time: Oct-11-2024
