Automated Origami Paper Packaging

We are plagued with a surfeit of plastic packaging protecting fragile things we buy. Even if you never buy anything online and only shop locally, odds are whatever you buy is made elsewhere and is shipped to the store. That fragile thing has to be protected on the way. There is a myriad of ways that plastics have been used to do that: foam peanuts, pre-formed foam, bubble wrap, air pillows, and so on. These plastics not only use fossil fuels to make, their use increases the risk of contributing to micro-plastic pollution if they are not recycled, and historically, little has been.

One alternative is paper and cardboard in various forms, as simple as crumpled-up sheets or as complex as fitted holders, like some egg cartons. The VTT Technical Research Centre in Finland, in collaboration with thirteen Finnish universities and industrial partners, is addressing that in novel way with a project called FOLD, and its successor project FOLD2. The projects have developed a new method to fold paper and cardboard, origami-style, and to do it automatically rather than by hand. They have invented a machine to elegantly fold the paper and cardboard into custom corrugations that can be used in various ways to protect vulnerable products. This is an ingenious solution.

Paper still has a GHG footprint, of course, but it can be recycled a few times, and even if it is not, it doesn’t break down into toxic micro particles if discarded or sent to landfill.

Sweet Lightning has no affiliation with any products or manufacturers mentioned in this article.

Reading

VTT Launches New Origami Packaging Technology | VTT News,” December 3, 2024. https://www.vttresearch.com/en/news-and-ideas/vtt-launches-new-origami-packaging-technology-create-sustainable-lightweight-durable.