What is the domestic development status of water-based ink?

Present situation, development and technological innovation of water-based ink industry in China.

Water-based ink is called ink for short. The main difference between water-based ink and oily ink lies in the difference of solvents. Water-based ink uses water (45%~50%) as solvent, which has extremely low VOC content and little environmental pollution. Oily ink uses organic solvents (toluene, xylene, industrial alcohol, etc.). ) as a solvent. In the flexible packaging industry, because solvent-based ink is mainly volatile and dry, the lower the boiling point of the solvent, the greater the volatility, releasing toxic gases to pollute the environment. Toxic substances will remain on the surface after printing, and the solvents used in water-based ink are water and ethanol excluded from the VOC list, which can greatly reduce VOC emissions.

The main components of ink structure are inorganic (organic) toner, rosin (acrylic acid) resin acid, additives (defoamer, dispersant, leveling agent, stabilizer) and water. The structure is relatively simple, the investment equipment is not large, and the profit rate is relatively high. So there are many domestic manufacturers at present, but the product quality is uneven. There are only 50 manufacturers producing carton ink on a certain scale in China. The types of carton ink mainly include ordinary ink (rosin resin), high-grade ink (acrylic resin) and medium-grade ink (part rosin resin, part acrylic resin). Because the resins used in high-grade inks are all acrylic resins, high-grade inks have the fastest drying speed, the highest water resistance, the best wear resistance, the highest color stability, high brightness, strong coloring power and no corrosion to plates, but their cost and technical content are high. Many ink and wash factories take high-grade ink and wash as their economic pillar.

In recent years, China has also made some regulations on food packaging, and the status of "green" printing in China is also constantly improving. At present, the consumption of water-based ink for soft packaging in China ranks first among other printing inks with 35%.

In April 2005, at the ink conference held in Hangzhou, many experts demanded to improve the environmental protection and hygiene of ink, and suggested to strengthen the control index of heavy metals in the ink industry standard. In July, 2005, the problem of peculiar smell appeared in the plastic soft packaging of potato chips of a company in Lanzhou, which once again aroused people's attention to environmental protection ink.

With the improvement of people's environmental awareness, the urgent demand for "green" printing materials is growing. Therefore, how to reduce the environmental pollution of ink and how to improve technological innovation have become the most important development direction of ink industry, and finally make new contributions to the development of ink industry in China. Therefore, this paper wants to give readers a current situation of ink painting industry and understand the application prospect of environmental protection ink painting.

1 Present situation of water-based ink industry in China

China ink industrialization has developed rapidly. The output is increasing, the product variety is increasing, the quality is improving and the grade is improving; The proportion of middle and high-grade products is constantly expanding, and the quality of some products has approached or reached the level of similar products abroad.

According to the statistics of the National Bureau of Statistics, the output of ink in China in 2005 was 302,300 tons, an increase of 17.20% on the basis of 257,900 tons in 2004. In 2005, the sales revenue of China ink products was 1, 1 5972900 yuan, an increase of 25.6% on the basis of last year's 92.365900 yuan. The data shows that the ink market in China is developing very rapidly.

However, due to the rising prices of raw materials and energy costs, the profit margin of the ink industry is declining, and the competition in the domestic market is becoming more and more fierce. At the same time, the environmental protection of ink has also become a concern of everyone.

Development of 1. 1 waterborne ink

As early as 1960s, people began to study and apply water-based ink. Due to the requirements of environmental protection and the shortage of petroleum raw materials, some developed countries gradually restrict the use of petroleum products to make printing ink. Therefore, people began to study non-organic solvent-based inks, which made great progress and development of water-based inks. The original water-based ink mainly used dextrin, shellac, casein, sodium lignosulfonate and other substances as the binder of water-based ink, and the prepared water-based ink was mainly used for printing some low-grade products.

By the end of 1960s, with the development of materials science, the synthetic technology of rosin and maleic acid modified resin was successful, which replaced casein, shellac and other materials and became the main materials of water-based ink, basically meeting the printing needs at that time. However, these primary products still have some shortcomings, such as poor gloss, poor water resistance, poor adhesion, easy foaming and poor storage stability. Later, people called the water-based ink produced at this stage the first generation product.

In 1970s, due to the oil crisis, the raw materials of printing ink were very tight again. At the same time, developed countries legislate to control air quality, limit the emission of volatile organic compounds (VOC) into the atmosphere, and limit the heavy metal content and residual solvents of packaging and printing products with strict sanitary conditions such as food, beverages and medicines. Ink researchers all over the world continue their in-depth research to produce solution styrene? The second generation water-based ink based on acrylic resin. This product makes up for the shortcomings of poor water resistance and storage stability of the first generation of water-based ink, but there is still a gap with solvent-based ink in gloss and printability. Therefore, ink researchers developed a polymer emulsion resin with core-shell structure and network structure by introducing acrylic monomer and styrene to polymerize on the basis of the second generation of water-based ink. This series of resins greatly improved the gloss and dryness of ink, promoted the development of water-based ink, and made water-based ink continuously expand its competitive field with solvent-based ink. Waterborne ink has entered a new development period.

China water-based ink was first introduced from Singapore. After years of use, the second generation of water-based ink was developed. The third generation water-based ink was directly imported to China. At present, the high-grade ink we use can be said to be the fourth generation product. First, Tianjin Ink Factory was successfully developed and put into production. It is characterized by self-developed resin or direct use of imported resin for production. At present, the domestic water-based ink technology has matured a lot compared with before. At present, four-color ink, dot, overprint and water-based ink for high-speed printing cartons can basically meet the requirements of most carton factories. The fourth generation of water-based ink products have low cost and quality not inferior to imported ink, and are trusted by customers.

At the end of 2003, Wuhan Institute of Modern Industry and Technology developed a series of water-based ink products, which are non-toxic, non-irritating, non-corrosive, non-flammable, non-explosive and safe to use. The new ink series can be widely used for printing gold and silver cardboard, coated paper, whiteboard paper, corrugated paper, self-adhesive paper, cartons, paper packaging bags and books. At the beginning of 2004, Shanghai Meide Fine Chemical Co., Ltd. recently launched all-water low-temperature thermosetting ink. The formaldehyde content of this product is lower than 15ppm, which meets the environmental protection requirements of textile printing and dyeing in Japan and Germany. MD？ 1002 All-water-based low-temperature thermosetting ink has great hiding power and fine texture, and can pass through a screen of more than 250 meshes without blocking the screen, so it is convenient to operate and the color of the ink can be adjusted at will. The ink is odorless and belongs to high-quality environmental protection products. In the past, all thermosetting inks were baked at high temperature, which often caused fabric discoloration and deformation, but this all-water low-temperature thermosetting ink completely avoided the above phenomenon. Generally, the heat treatment of the finished product can be the same as that of ordinary mucilage printing, with 120 degree baking 1 minute to 2 minutes. The koji ink has excellent stretchability on knitted fabrics, and the fastness to washing and rubbing is above grade 4, and the shelf life can reach 5 years in a sealed and cool place. Its biggest advantage is that it saves electricity, thus greatly reducing the production cost. This product is widely used in cotton, chemical fiber and other fabrics except waterproof nylon cloth.

1.2 Present situation of ink production enterprises

Judging from the present situation of ink production enterprises in China, in recent years, Taiwan-funded ink enterprises in developed countries have developed rapidly, first of all, Hangzhou ink factory, followed by ink factories in Shanghai, Tianjin, Taiyuan, Shunde, Shenzhen and Jinan. At present, more than 40 joint ventures in China have introduced foreign advanced technology and equipment, and their ink output accounts for about half of the total ink output in China due to their good technical strength.

In addition, private ink enterprises also occupy a certain market. These enterprises are small in scale, but flexible in mechanism, low in ink price, flexible in sales and strong in adaptability. At present, there are more than 400 ink production enterprises in China, of which about 70: 6 are located in Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Guangdong, Shandong and Hebei, but no? The output of various industries can reach 10% of the total national ink output.

Domestic ink enterprises generally have problems such as small scale, lack of talents, insufficient funds and low R&D investment. Their technological innovation ability is not strong, and their production technology lags behind the world level. At present, China has formed a number of ink production backbone enterprises represented by Shanghai Peony Ink Co., Ltd., Tianjin Toyo Ink Co., Ltd., Hangzhou Hanghua Ink Co., Ltd. and Peking University Deli Technology Co., Ltd., which have made great contributions to the technological progress of China's ink industry.

From the perspective of ink products, in order to meet the needs of the printing market, China relies on scientific and technological progress to continuously develop new products. The main products are sheet-fed offset printing quick-drying ink, web offset printing ink, gravure printing ink, flexographic printing ink, screen printing ink, iron printing ink, ultraviolet curing ink, water-based ink, anti-counterfeiting ink and so on. The above ink products not only have more and more varieties, reaching more than 50 kinds, but also have higher and higher quality. Some enterprises produce ink in Pontone. Tianjin Toyo Ink Co., Ltd., Shanghai DIC Ink Co., Ltd., Zhejiang New Oriental Ink Group Co., Ltd., Yunnan Hongta Yuehai Ink Co., Ltd. and other enterprises have passed the ISO9000 series quality system certification. Generally speaking, most of the inks produced in China are middle and low grade inks, and the supply exceeds the demand. Some high-end products and special products need to be imported. In 200 1 year, the imported ink reached 24,700 tons, with the amount of165438+50 million yuan.

From the management situation, domestic major ink production enterprises have introduced foreign advanced technology and production equipment, such as bead mill, inclined three-roller ink roller and filtering equipment produced by Buhler Company in Switzerland, which greatly improved the management level of enterprises and promoted the technological progress and development of ink enterprises. However, the overall level of China ink in terms of output, quality and variety still lags behind advanced foreign countries, and the printability (such as transfer printing, water resistance and high-speed printability) is insufficient, and the product consistency is not ideal, which cannot meet the needs of high-speed and high-quality printing. Some products still need to be imported. The quality, quantity and variety of raw materials for ink production in China can't keep up with the pace of ink production, and some raw materials still rely on imports. In addition, the development of special anti-counterfeiting ink is slow, which can not meet the needs of the development of packaging printing and anti-counterfeiting printing, and the electronic ink needed for digital printing can not be produced in China.

Technical Status of 1.3 Waterborne Ink

1.3. 1 Technical transformation of water-based ink

Through the technical improvement from 10 to 15, the ink system successfully solved most of the original difficulties, such as difficulty in use, storage of ink, limitation of substrate, corona treatment and surface tension. The new generation of ink has changed its initial disadvantages into advantages, and gradually grown and matured.

1. Advantages of ink painting

1) Ink painting has advantages in environment and safety. Many paper products can be designed with low VOCs or zero Vcs when they are printed with ink and ink.

2) The ink has the advantages of stability and low flammability. Because of the low volatility of water, the ink has better viscosity stability;

3) The new generation of water-based products are easier to clean than solvent systems, and the whole cleaning work of printing machine parts can be completed by washing with soapy water or weak alkaline lotion, thus improving production efficiency.

Manufacturers of ink and ink painting have overcome most of the difficulties in the ink and ink painting system and are actively trying to solve the existing difficulties.

2. Difficulties in the application of ink painting technology

1) Drying time is still the most important problem in the application of ink painting. Unless the printing machine is equipped with sufficient drying equipment, the printing speed will be affected. This is also the most important factor affecting the process of replacing solvent-based ink with ink;

2) Because ink is dissolved in alkaline solution, the application of ink in strong magnetic environment is limited;

3) The application of ink in frozen food packaging still does not have the tolerance of solvent ink, although the distance is rapidly shortening.

1.3.2 technical problems of water-based ink

In the process of using quick-drying agent ink, the drying speed of ink may be slow because of different resins selected by ink manufacturers or too fast machine speed. Drying agent can adjust the drying speed of ink, meet the speed requirements of printing machine and improve production efficiency, and its usage ratio is 2 ~ 3%. Slow drying agent can inhibit and slow down the drying speed of ink, keep moisture, prevent ink from drying on printing plate or anilox roller, and reduce the occurrence of printing faults such as blocking and pasting. The usage ratio is between 1 ~ 2%.

Scope of application of water-based ink

After introducing the structure and types of water-based ink, let's talk about several important factors affecting the printing quality of water-based ink. In paper printing, ink transfer and ink quantity control are undertaken by anilox roller. Therefore, the anilox roller must be selected according to the requirements of the product, and the number of lines of the anilox roller is about 4 times that of printed matter, so as to obtain better printing clarity and resolution.

Fineness refers to the size of toner particles in ink, which is completed in the process of producing ink paste. This is a key quality index. Whether the process of making color paste is scientific and meticulous plays an absolute role in the quality of ink and wash. It is best to add dispersant and wetting agent in the process of producing color paste. Generally, the fineness of ink is required to be between10 and 25 μ m. Too fine or too large will affect the fluidity and rheology of ink.

Viscosity refers to the consistency of ink, which is an indicator of ink flow. Excessive viscosity will cause poor fluidity and slow drying; Low viscosity ink has good fluidity, fast drying, thin ink layer and low ink consumption. The viscosity of ordinary ink is 50 ~ 65/25℃ (coated with 4# cup), and the viscosity of high-grade ink is controlled at 25 ~ 35/25℃ (coated with 4# cup). If the ink viscosity is low, the toner content should be high; On the contrary, the toner content is low. Because viscosity directly affects the transfer of ink and the quality of printed matter, it is very important to control the viscosity of ink. In the printing process, low viscosity will lead to lighter color, and high viscosity will lead to dirty and paste plates, so please add transfer agent when it is difficult to control, which can improve the transfer effect and increase the vividness and three-dimensional sense of color.

1.3.3 additives for water-based ink

Additives commonly used in water-based inks. There are mainly pH stabilizers, defoamers, quick-drying agents and slow-drying agents.

1.pH stabilizer

The PH stabilizer is mainly used to adjust the pH value of ink. When ink manufacturers promote ink products to printing enterprises, they often mention the pH value of ink. Low pH value is easy to cause ink caking, while high pH value will lead to relatively low viscosity. Generally, the change of pH value of ink should be detected in the printing process. When the pH value is lower than 8, an appropriate amount of pH stabilizer should be added to keep the ink in a good printing state. The pH value of ink in European countries is neutral. When the pH value is adjusted to 8.5, its fluidity and gloss reach the best state. However, in the printing process (within one hour), due to the volatilization of amine solvents, the viscosity of ink will increase rapidly, the gloss will decrease, and the fluidity will become worse, resulting in a large number of unqualified products. If the pH value is adjusted, amine solvent needs to be added, and during the printing process (within one hour), continuous testing (using an acidity meter) will be carried out. If you are not careful, waste products will appear, and the whole workshop will be full of unpleasant smells. This product is considered to have poor printability. For example, when the pH value of ink is between 7 and 8, the stability of ink is the best. Users can add pure water as a solvent to reduce the viscosity, without increasing the cost or reducing the taste of ink resin.

Step 2 eliminate bubbles

Defoamer ink with high viscosity, low pH value, fast printing speed and too much water added by printing technicians are easy to produce bubbles. When the bubbles are relatively large, the printed matter will appear white and the amount of ink will be less, which will seriously affect the printing quality. It is generally suggested to add foam inhibitor and surface defoamer to ink and wash to solve the foaming phenomenon of ink and wash, and the use ratio is 1 ~ 2%.

3. Quick-drying agent

In the process of using quick-drying agent ink, the drying speed of ink may be slow because of different resins selected by ink manufacturers or too fast machine speed. Drying agent can adjust the drying speed of ink, meet the speed requirements of printing machine and improve production efficiency, and its usage ratio is 2 ~ 3%.

4. Slow-drying agent

Slow drying agent can inhibit and slow down the drying speed of ink, keep moisture, prevent ink from drying on printing plate or anilox roller, and reduce the occurrence of printing faults such as blocking and pasting. The usage ratio is between 1 ~ 2%.

1.3.4 the use of water-based ink

1. Ink and solvent ink cannot be mixed. In the process of use, add water appropriately, and when it is really necessary to adjust the viscosity or drying speed, add an appropriate amount of additives such as alcohols or esters.

2. Before use, it should be stirred evenly and then poured into the ink tank, and the viscosity should be properly adjusted with water before use. The unused ones should be covered with packaging barrels, and the ink and wash should not be allowed to volatilize in nature.

3. Before use, check whether all technical indicators, especially hue, meet your own requirements. If the hue deviation is large, please inform the ink manufacturer to make appropriate allocation to avoid disputes between the two parties due to hue error.

4. In the printing process, because the volatilization of water will affect the original viscosity and pH value of ink, it is necessary to check the viscosity and pH value frequently, and add pure tap water or pH stabilizer when necessary.

5. After printing, the ink remaining on the printing equipment should be washed with clean water, and the ink on the anilox roller of the printing machine should be washed with cleaning agent to serve the next printing.

1.3.5 Get out of the misunderstanding of using water-based ink.

Not all users of water-based ink understand the viscosity principle, and many people have the misunderstanding that ink with high viscosity is good ink. You can add more water and print more cartons to reduce costs and improve efficiency. In fact, it is very unrealistic and unscientific to blindly buy high-grade ink and water washing according to the performance of production equipment, and think that with high-grade ink and water washing, good quality printed matter can be printed.

The simplest test standard of high-grade ink is whether it fades, but it is not particularly accurate to think that ink that does not fade is high-grade or that high-grade ink does not fade. Because so far, the problem of color loss is still a difficult problem all over the world, and no ink factory can make ink that does not lose color. If the ink does not fade, the only way is to use offset printing, either a layer of varnish or a layer of PVC.

The printing effect of printed matter is influenced by many factors, such as printing machine, ink and wash, cardboard, technical operators and climate change. However, once the end customer reports that there is something wrong with the carton, the carton factory will often find the ink manufacturer for discussion at the first time. In fact, we should look for the reasons for this problem in many ways. It is indeed the quality problem of ink itself, which should be punished by economic means.

At present, the price of ink is low, the profit margin is relatively small, and the carton printing plant controls the cost tightly, desperately pushing down the price of ink, and the general ink factory is struggling to cope with reducing the cost. There is no time and enough funds to develop products, improve product quality and better serve the carton factory. In fact, the cost of paper is the key point, and most of the production costs of carton plants are on paper or cardboard. Ink accounts for less than 0.0 1% of the cost of a carton, so it is not worth spending so much time and energy to deal with the price of ink. In addition, in order to promote the service brand, some ink and wash factories send computer color-adjusting machines to carton factories, thinking that they have found treasures, but in fact, they have invisibly increased the production costs of carton factories.

Because it is not universal, at present, except for the computer color mixer for baking paint in high-consumption automobile industry, other industries rarely purchase it. Whether the carton industry, as a low-value consumable, must be equipped with a computer color mixer to increase expenses is a matter of opinion, which is worth pondering.

Production status of 1.4 water-based ink

In recent years, flexographic printing has developed rapidly in the world, and it is considered as "the best and most promising printing method on earth" in developed countries in Europe and America. In the United States, 95% of flexographic printing and 80% of gravure printing use ink and water washing. Flexographic printing in China is still in its infancy, and currently only accounts for about 3% of the printing field. However, with the gradual popularization of environmental protection packaging, many cigarette factories, wineries, pharmaceutical factories, cosmetics factories and children's toy enterprises are ready to use flexographic printing product packaging, and the proportion of flexographic printing in the printing field will gradually increase, especially in the packaging and printing field. In flexographic packaging printing, water-based ink printing is widely used at home and abroad. From 1995 to the end of 1998 in China, more than 30 combined flexographic printing lines were introduced in just a few years, which were distributed in more than 20 provinces and cities in China. There are nearly 200 narrow flexographic printing lines in China, and now about 30 sets are added every year. There are also many imported high-grade three-color and four-color water-based inks used for corrugated paper color printing in printing slotting machine.

On average, there are more than 65,438+0,000 carton factories in each province of China. If high-grade cartons are printed with 10% water-based ink, each household needs about 1000 tons of water-based ink every year. By 20 10, the share of flexographic printing in the printing field will reach about 15%, and the annual demand for water-based ink will be more than 150,000 tons. This does not include the ink used in flexographic printing and other printing and packaging products (at present, water-based ink is used in 100% flexographic printing and 80% gravure printing in China). There is an urgent need to research, develop and produce high-grade water-based ink, which can be widely used in flexographic printing and gravure printing fields such as gold and silver cardboard, coated paper, gable paper, plastic film, corrugated paper, self-adhesive paper, cartons, paper packaging, books and magazines.

Advantages and disadvantages of 1.5 water-based ink

1.5. 1 huge "green" advantage

Waterborne ink does not contain volatile organic solvents, which greatly reduces the emission of volatile organic compounds (VOC, the same below), thus reducing air pollution, improving the environment of printing operators and benefiting the health of employees. It can completely eliminate some toxic and harmful substances in solvent-based ink, eliminate the harm to human body and the pollution to packaged goods, and improve the overall environmental quality. It is especially suitable for packaging and printing of products with strict sanitary conditions such as cigarettes, wine, food, beverages, medicines and children's toys. In addition, it can not only reduce the fire hazards and hidden dangers caused by static electricity and flammable solvents, but also reduce the toxicity left by the printing surface and facilitate the cleaning of printing equipment.

1.5.2 problems of water-based ink

At present, both imported and domestic water-based inks are not resistant to alkali, ethanol and water, and have slow drying and poor gloss, which easily causes paper shrinkage. To achieve alkali resistance, ethanol resistance, water resistance and improve gloss, only flexible UV ink can be used. This not only increases the printing cost, but also increases the printing process. For example, some automatic beer packaging production lines use alkaline lubricants, whose pH value is 9- 10, which is unbearable for water-based inks and will fade when touched. In summer, beer sold in the south should not only be put in the refrigerator, but also be soaked in ice water for a long time, which is unbearable for water-based ink.

2 China water-based ink development trend

2. 1 World ink giants have invested in establishing ink bases.

Since the end of last century, with the rapid development of China ink industry, the output of ink has ranked fourth in the world. Especially after China's entry into WTO, China ink industry is facing fierce competition. The world's ink giants can't resist the huge temptation of the China market, and have established and expanded their production bases in China. For example, Japanese Sun Ink Co., Ltd. established an ink factory with an annual output of 3,000 tons in Suzhou in 2003, becoming the company's fourth overseas production base after the United States, South Korea and Taiwan Province Province.

In 2004, Flint Ink (Beijing) Co., Ltd., a joint venture of American Flint Ink Company in Daxing, Beijing, was officially put into production, mainly producing news ink, and will become the deployment center of thermosetting ink; Japan Dainippon Ink Chemical Industry Co., Ltd. (DIC) built an organic pigment and ink factory in Nantong, Jiangsu; Other ink factories established in China include Shanghai DC Ink Co., Ltd., Shenzhen Shenri Ink Co., Ltd., Taiyuan Costco Laurie Ink Chemical Co., Ltd., Guangzhou (Costco) Ink Co., Ltd., Shenzhen Costco Laurie Ink Co., Ltd. and Yunnan Di Aisheng Ink Co., Ltd. ... Japan Toyo Co., Ltd. has successively invested in Jiangmen Toyo Ink Co., Ltd., Tianjin Toyo Ink Co., Ltd., Shanghai Toyo Ink Co., Ltd., Zhuhai Toyo Ink Co., Ltd. and Toyo Ink ( In 2004, the newly-built Shanghai Toyo Ink Manufacturing Co., Ltd. in China officially opened; SakataINk established Maoming Ink Factory which produces offset printing ink and Nansha Ink Factory which mainly produces offset printing ink and metal can ink in China. In 2004, Bantian Ink (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. invested in Shanghai with an annual output of 3,600 tons, and its products are mainly gravure inks.

2.2 Actively respond to standardization and environmental protection technology innovation

The large-scale entry of foreign capital has greatly improved the production capacity of China ink industry, but at the same time it has also brought great impact to domestic small and medium-sized ink enterprises. How to remain invincible in the cruel market has become a serious problem faced by domestic ink manufacturing enterprises. In order to compete with foreign ink giants, domestic ink enterprises must understand their own advantages and disadvantages, foster strengths and avoid weaknesses, actively participate in competition, seize opportunities, learn to cooperate with foreign ink giants and innovate together; Strive to expand the international market, especially the markets of third world countries; Further strengthen the awareness of "standardization and environmental protection", integrate with ISO9000 quality system, expand the domestic ink market, enter the international market, and gradually replace the old products with environmentally friendly and energy-saving ink products; It is necessary to strengthen the supporting ability of pigment resin and additives to industrial inks; It is necessary to continuously strengthen the technical training of ink talents and improve their professional quality to meet the technical requirements of adopting a variety of foreign advanced equipment and products and highly automated production. Strengthen technological innovation, management innovation and system innovation, improve management level, gradually realize scale expansion, and further increase market share.

2.3 Development direction and trend of water-based ink industrialization

Domestic ink industry must seize the opportunity, meet the challenge and take the development direction of water-based ink industrialization, with the overall goal of "high speed, multi-color, quick drying, no pollution, low consumption and standardization"; It is necessary to improve the adaptability of ink products to the requirements of printing technology and printing quality, improve their scientific and technological content, especially to meet the needs of the development of high-tech, multi-variety, colorful and artistic packaging prints, optimize product structure and develop more high-quality printing inks; In the future, large, medium and small ink production enterprises should further deepen the reform, optimize the combination, develop in a reasonable and standardized direction, and make new contributions to the development of China ink industry.

3 China water-based ink technology innovation

At present, the ink in short supply or blank in China belongs to dry high-tech ink, all kinds of water-based ink, waterless offset printing ink, food packaging ink, offset printing light-fast ink, special anti-counterfeiting ink, non-aromatic thermosetting offset printing ink and so on. We are eager for the technical innovation and scientific development of ink technology developers.

At present, there are no strict environmental regulations on ink in China, but just like the domestic coating industry, environmental regulations on ink will be introduced sooner or later. Non-volatile organic compound (VOC) ink and water-based ink have been tested in the brains or laboratories of every ink manufacturer in order to be put on the market quickly when environmental regulations are promulgated. In addition, it is necessary to understand the harmfulness of oily ink and the seriousness brought by the oil crisis and ink energy consumption, so that the technological innovation of water-based ink can be on the right track. The following (see 3.2) illustrates the technological innovation achievements of water-based ink in domestic ink enterprises in recent years.

3. 1 Harmfulness of oily ink

Oily ink is the biggest pollution source in printing industry. In 2004, the annual output of world ink was about 3.5 million tons. Solvent-based ink accounts for 30 ~ 40% on average, and the amount of organic solvent brought by ink in the world is as high as 6,543,800 tons per year. In addition, ink also contains heavy metal elements harmful to human body.

3. 1. 1 Harm to human body

Printing ink consists of binders, fillers, additives and other substances. Organic pigments contain lead, chromium, mercury, copper and other metal elements, which have certain toxicity and cannot be used for food packaging. Individual pigments contain benzidine, which is carcinogenic and should be strictly prohibited. The adhesive contains about 40-50% organic solvent, which will damage human skin if exposed for a long time. Passive inhalation of organic solvents in the air may also lead to respiratory diseases. These materials are very harmful to human health.