Newspaper printers use recycling to reduce costs

Successfully printing a newspaper requires a large amount of material. A newspaper's price of five dollars (about four Hong Kong dollars) is only enough to cover the cost of paper and ink, and most of the other expenses are dependent on advertising revenue. Therefore, how to make proper use of materials while maintaining the same printing quality requires great effort. The cost of printing ink is second only to labor and paper expenses, making it the third highest material cost for newspapers.
The Chattanooga Times Free Press in Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA, conducted a study on how to use the ink's efficacy to the limit level. The ideal method is to reduce the consumption of ink while maintaining the printing standard. This reflects the right balance between cost, efficiency and quality.

The black ink that we received in the printing room was concentrated (ie, "raw" ink). Prior to the printing of newspapers, the printing ink must be filled with fresh water and sometimes added to the circulation and then diluted with ink to become ink. Printing presses generally use several hours to complete the printing of newspapers, followed by cleaning, and after a few hours, another printing process. It is not surprising that we clean the press twice or three times a day, four times, and the amount of water consumed is astonishing. At the same time, it means that the quality of water after cleaning has a large amount of recycled ink, which is only needed to remove the clean water and residues. A thick layer of recycled ink is used for immediate display, including some original ink. However, it is not enough for printing after diluting the recycling and printing ink, and only need to add additional original printing ink.

Chattanooga attempts to systematically evaluate the proportion of the original ink and the amount of recycled ink to obtain the most appropriate cost and print quality relationship. This is to be evaluated. Since most flexographic newspaper printing companies spend millions of dollars each year on printing ink, the printing method that can save the original printing ink will be a major discovery.