What are the difference between BOPP & BOPLA

First of all, What is Biaxially Oriented Manufacturing

Before we begin to look into the difference between BOPP & BOPLA, we needed to know what the abbreviation is for BO. Biaxial orientation (BO) is a manufacturing process where a plastic film or plastic sheet is being stretched both machine and transverse directions, hence the name biaxial orientation. As this biaxial orientation production process can be applied with wide range of polymers, such as Nylon, Polypropylene, and more, the industry has abbreviated these biaxial orientation films as BOPA, BOPP and etc.

What is BOPP?

BOPP is an abbreviation for Biaxially-Oriented Polypropylene. It is a flexible packaging film that is widely applied for cosmetic, food & beverage, consumer products and electronic industries. It shares the properties of Polypropylene polymer and is very flexible, fatigue resistance, moisture resistance, low toxicity and adjustable transparency which make it perfect for use such as packaging labels, food containers & bags, medical grade applications and more. As a result, BOPP is now one of the commonly used film in flexible packaging fields.

What are the concerns in BOPP Applications?

While BOPP is an excellent film material that can be used for wide range of applications including flexible packaging, there are increasing concern that the majority of use of BOPP has been made towards single use plastic uses. Many environmental associations and NGO now try to address the issues in plastic waste pollutions, and actions and regulations are being drafted to try to target these problems.

What is BOPLA?

BOPLA stands for Biaxially-Oriented Polylactic Acid Film. As Polylactic Acid is both bio-based biodegradable plastic, the development in PLA applications was seen as a potential solution to plastic waste problem. Being both bio-based and biodegradable, BOPLA not only use less energy during the production process, it also contributes to circular economy being a renewable resource made from corn. What is more it is biodegradable so it does not contribute towards micro-plastic issue.

Concerns in Biodegradability

While biodegradable polymers such as PLA and PBAT can biodegrade through time, many experts has questioned the efficiency and conditions it needs to meet to effectively biodegrade. The concerns in biodegradable polymers is that once the material is thrown into a natural environment such as into the soil or marines, these biodegradable plastic will not meet the right conditions in temperature, humidity, PH level and more. The European Commission experts has commented that it would be near impossible for any natural environments to just meet the right compostable conditions. As a result, biodegradable polymer in single use plastics are also banned and restricted in various of countries.

Conclusion

Currently in single use plastic scope, we have observed that biodegradable solution are being disapproved by many European, Asia and North America countries. The current trend is to enforce better recyclability through Mono-material plastics and banning polymers such as PVC plastics that can not be easily recycled and reused by current mechanical recycling methods.