The write stuff: Bioplastics, WPCs find way into writing tools

Keyboards probably account for more words than pens and pencils, but there is still a massive market for the latter, and manufacturers of writing utensils increasingly are considering alternatives to established materials for their products.

For instance, Australian-based bioplastics supplier Cardia Bioplastics Ltd. reports it has been collaborating with the Beifa Group, the country's largest stationery company, to develop a new pen manufactured from Cardia Biohybrid resin. This material combines renewable thermoplastic with polyolefins, reducing the use of petroleum-based thermoplastic in the pens.

The Beifa Group has a total export volume exceeding $100 million and its customers include Wal-Mart, Staples, Office Depot, National Pen, Myron, and Metro. The new pens are injection molded on the same equipment used for the 100% standard thermoplastic pens. Final product development is complete and Cardia reports that market trials have been successful, so that Beifa Group is ordering commercial quantities. Cardia expects a supply agreement to be completed this month or next.

Meanwhile, a partnership in Europe has taken the wooden pencil to task and developed what is called the Wopex Pencil. German writing materials company Staedtler worked with extrusion tooling supplier Greiner Tool.Tec (Nussbach, Austria) to develop co-extrusion tooling for the production of these pencils, made from a wood/plastic composite (WPC) with up to 70% wood content.

For the project, Greiner Tool.Tec technical manager Leopold Weiermayer says three tooling prototypes were developed and

produced. The heart of the development is a pencil with a lead that is extruded sheathed in wood in a single working process. Wood content is sourced from PEFC-certified wood from sustainably cultivated forests. Staedtler (Nuremberg) has eight production facilities worldwide and 24 sales and distribution subsidiaries, and employs more than 2500.