Green Benefits Help NAU Fund Hybrid Flatbed

Dylan Turner has wanted a wide-format flatbed printer for a long time.

“It’s just always been one of my goals,” says the assistant director of Printing Services at Northern Arizona University. “From a business efficiency point of view, it’s just a no-brainer. You’re cutting out steps in the process — and materials.”

But flatbeds are expensive, not to mention quite large — two serious challenges to his dreams. Nevertheless, in January, after three years of perseverance, compromise, and ingenuity, Turner’s in-plant fired up an EFI Pro 16h hybrid flatbed/roll-fed UV LED inkjet printer with a 65" print width and Fiery XF RIP software.

To fund the purchase, Turner tapped into NAU’s strong focus on sustainability. He put together a proposal for the NAU Green Fund, the main source for sustainability funding on campus. In it, he detailed the sustainability benefits this hybrid flatbed would bring to NAU:

• By printing directly onto substrates instead of onto adhesive vinyl and mounting to Coroplast, 1,800 sq. ft. of PVC-based adhesive vinyl will be eliminated per year, as well as related waste.
• The device will enable the in-plant to insource 3,500 sq. ft. of previously outsourced work per year, eliminating the need to ship this material back to the university, which reduces the carbon impact. What’s more, the in-plant can offer sustainable paper-based options not available through outside vendors.
• The printer uses low-energy UV LED curing lamps with bulbs that will last approximately 10,000 hours of run time.
• The printer’s white ink is very opaque and only needs one layer, resulting in less ink required per print.

His presentation was successful, and the in-plant received a $65,000 grant from the Green Fund. To pay the remainder, Printing Services took a two-year loan from University Capital Assets.

The space problem was also tough to navigate.

“We have a pretty small facility,” Turner says. “It’s only 5,000 sq. ft.”

He originally wanted a true flatbed, and looked seriously at the Canon Arizona. But he had to face reality: “It didn’t fit through our doorway,” he laments.

In the EFI Pro 16h, however, he found “a very robust hybrid flatbed. For our volume level, it was perfect.” It came with “solid” front and back tables, he says, which can be collapsed and moved to open up space.

Accompanying the EFI Pro 16h was a new SmartFog industrial humidifier system to address Arizona’s extremely dry climate.

“In the winter we struggle significantly,” Turner says. “It will get down to 7% relative humidity.”

The EFI Pro 16h requires minimum humidity levels of at least 20%, he says.

One of the first jobs the shop did on the new printer was to print 46 different-sized photographs directly on foam core for an exhibit in NAU’s Martin Springer Institute. Previously outsourced, the prints were inserted into A-frames.

Turner is also excited about the printer’s white ink capabilities. The shop has gotten requests for clear stickers printed with white ink.

“White ink has been slowly growing,” he remarks.

He likes that the EFI Pro 16h can print on pre-cut boards, enabling the shop to turn scrap materials into finished products. And because it’s a hybrid device, it can provide redundancy for the in-plant’s seven-year-old roll-fed EFI Latex printer.

Since getting the EFI Pro 16h, the in-plant has switched to recyclable rigid media board substrates like Falconboard. Launched under the name Go Green Eco Friendly display board, this product has excited customers who want to move away from single-use Coroplast signs to a recyclable material.

“So we’re moving from a completely plastic product with ink on it to a paper-based, biodegradable product with ink on it,” Turner says.

This initiative joins other sustainability efforts by the in-plant, such as switching to PVC-free alternatives like 3M Envision wrap films and replacing plastic name badges with aluminum, which is recyclable. The shop uses environmentally friendly toner papers like Neenah Environment PC100, along with paper-based tape instead of plastic for boxing and recycled bags instead of shrink wrapping.

Inspired by his success with the NAU Green Fund, Turner is now writing another proposal, this time seeking funding for an electric delivery vehicle.