Our Beliefs
Reuse and recycling are the most efficient and beneficial Green practices available today. Infinity Images strives to reuse and recycle materials whenever possible, both within our facility, and with the products and services we offer to our customers.
Our future depends on being Green. We have already invested in UV Direct print to substrate capabilities. Using this technology reduces costs, waste, and many of the unspoken by-products of production, (such as release liners from roll adhesives). Whether direct printing to recyclable materials or using Green components to create biodegradable products, the solution to the problem of creating land fills lie not only with the vendor, but with the customer. Recycling on a mass scale only works when it is easy for the customer and economical for the recycler. For example, plastic recycling was not common long ago, but now is part of our everyday lives, both at work and in our homes. As more people join us in our efforts to be green, more biodegradable products are becoming a reality; not just banners, but “boards” and adhesives too.
Transportation costs (fuel use), manufacturing processes, and the energy consumed in making products all contribute to the ecological cost and the carbon footprint of each graphic we make. We are looking to take our Green initiative to the next level by evaluating these factors and working on ways to reduce them.
We, like any other business, send and receive corrugated boxes. We work with the City of Portland’s award winning recycling program to insure that our corrugated and paper products are returned to the supply stream for reuse. We specify recycled content or recyclable packaging whenever possible.
The next step is plastics. Our industry uses a fair amount of them. In our facility, all plastic materials including the following are recycled:
Vinyl | Coroplast | Sintra | Acrylic | Styrene | Polycarbonate | PETG | ABS
These materials are eventually resold and used to make new plastics.
We recycle all of the ink cartridges used on our Seiko, HP 5000 and all of our office printers. Through a third party, these cartridges are sent back to the manufacturer for cleaning and reuse. By doing this, we keep the plastic in use, rather than in land fills, reducing the need to use new energy and materials to manufacture new cartridges.
Some materials necessary to produce the products we sell pose some limited risks if improperly used or disposed of. These items cannot be directly recycled and must carefully be managed before disposal. We make a point to ensure that these by-products are disposed of properly. We generate as little waste by-products as possible. But before disposing of our used photo chemistry, we pre-treat it by removing the silver ions that are a natural by-product of the photo process. We use two recovery systems to scrub the silver out of the waste before it is discharged. After printing with our solvent or UV curable machines, we end up with small quantities of “waste” ink. Whether it is the residual left at the bottom of the ink supply container or the ink that is used to purge ink out of the print heads, we collect the discarded ink in a large drum which is periodically hauled away through a legally regulated and documented process.
One of the reasons we live and work in Oregon is because it is green. We at Infinity Images are continually working to keep Oregon not only green, but Green. Through our practices, we hope to “spread the green” and lessen carbon footprint.
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