Environmental Credentials

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What Are The Environmental Credentials of Displays 2 Go's Eco-Friendlier Products?

Displays 2 Go recognizes the importance of contributing to a sustainable environment. One of our guiding principals is to continually improve the environmental impact of the processes and materials used when designing and manufacturing our evolving range of display and exhibition products.

1. Graphics Produced Using the Dye Sublimation Printing Process:

The environmentally friendlier printing process used on our eco-friendlier products is known as dye sublimation printing.

What is Dye Sublimation Printing?

Sublimation is when a substance transitions between the solid and gas states without going through a liquid stage; the action of dry ice exposed to room temperature is a common example. In a dye sublimation printer the water-based printing dye is heated up until it turns into a gas, at which point it diffuses onto the printed material (in our case the fabric). The result is an image that penetrates the fibres of the fabric, providing a vibrant, long life and colour fast image.

The Environmental Advantages of Dye Sublimation Printing onto Fabric:

• Reduced Water Use
  As the solid turns straight into a gas without going through the liquid phase, dye sublimation is a completely waterless printing process. For this same reason, the whole printing cycle is extremely clean; there are no liquid inks to clean up and no print heads to get clogged. This significantly reduces the amount of waste water going into the environment.
  Dye sublimation offers another advantages over wide format inkjet printing - which is traditionally used in the display industry. As no water is used in the process the prints are dry and ready to handle as soon as they exit the printer. Often ink-jet printers use energy soaking heaters to dry their prints when quick turnarounds are required.
• Waterbased Inks - No Volatile Organic Compounds!
  Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are organic chemical compounds that have high enough vapour pressures under normal conditions to significantly vapourise and enter the atmosphere. A wide range of carbon-based molecules, such as aldehydes, ketones, and other light hydrocarbons are VOCs
  The inks used in dye sublimation printing are water based therefore they don't produce the VOCs associated with solvent based inks. In fact, water based dyes are so environmentally friendly they can be safely poured down the sink.

2. Fabric Graphics:

The base graphic subtrate (i.e. what the graphic is printed on) on the majority of our eco-friendlier products is a high quality polyester fabric. This premium fabric ensures a colour fast and vibrant result as well as optimum ink penetration. It is bio-degradable and leaves very little residue in the environment (unlike PVC and other traditional banner materials).

Our standard polyester fabric is approximately 90% recycled, with the main source being used PET bottles that are transformed into polyester thread.

Reduced Carbon Footprint:

• Due to its light weight and the ability to fold into a small package, fabric prints are considerably more energy efficient when transported than the heavy traditional banner vinyls - which often need to be packaged in high volume tubes. Your organisation's "Carbon Footprint" can therefore be significantly reduced - particularly when sending replacement or interchangeable graphics to multiple locations.
• Fabrics "compactness" also means it takes up very little storage space.

Other advantages of using fabric:

• Fabric can be folded up - it doesn't need to rolled into cumbersome and large cardboard tubes for transport & storage
• Washable - if fabric prints get dirty simply wash them! They won't lose any colour.
• Lightweight, lower volume and therefore less expensive to ship
• No risk of scratched laminates, kinks or damage, unlike traditional banner materials. This means less replacements!
• No curl on the edges of your valuable graphic print

3. Environmentally Responsible Hardware - Recyclable Aluminium

As well as being lightweight and strong, the aluminium extrusions and framing used in our display hardware is recyclable, and, depending on the product, up to 80% recycled.

The recycling process involves simply re-melting the metal, which is far less expensive and less energy intensive than creating new aluminium which must first be mined from bauxite ore and then refined using significant amounts of energy. Recycling scrap aluminum requires only 5% of the energy used to make new aluminium.

Unlike many other materials when recycled, aluminium loses none of its structural integrity and is therefore infinitely recyclable. Recycled aluminium is always mixed with a portion of new aluminium so as to achieve an attractive finish on the end product.

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