Sarcina Packaging is proud to be one of the UK’s leading suppliers of fully home compostable carrier bags. With the ability to manufacture your bags in any desired size, print them in up to 8 colours and change the gauge to suit your products, you can be sure we will be able to offer a solution suitable for you and your customers.
Where the common, ubiquitous polythene bag is made from a polymer derived from petroleum, Sarcina’s biodegradable and compostable carrier bags are made from a specialist compound derived from plant starches, vegetable oils and compostable polymers. This means that bags draw down carbon from the atmosphere during the manufacturing process and are made from 100% renewable materials.
When left in a home compost heap, many ‘Compostable’ and ‘Biodegradable’ bags will not degrade for years. This is because most compostable bags that are on the market today are sold as bags that will biodegrade in an ‘industrial compost facility’. These facilities have to create very specific conditions in order for the material to compost, the balance of moisture, heat and micro-organisms has to be perfect and the process can take upwards of 12 months. Furthermore, there is currently no defined route for industrial compostable materials to reach any of these limited facilities.
Sarcina Packaging’s compostable carrier bags will degrade in your home compost heap in ambient conditions of 20-25 degrees, in less than six months. Over the course of those six months, our certified material will break down into water and carbon dioxide, and nothing else. If stored in the right conditions the bags have a shelf life of 12-18 months before they start to lose their load capacity.
During manufacturing, the bioplastic that we use behaves in exactly the same way as any other polymer. This means that it offers an extremely good print surface and can allow us to print detailed graphics in up to 8 colours using an extremely high-quality rotogravure printing press. We can also extrude the material to any thickness, from 5mu to 400mu. The material can then be converted into anything from vest/t-shirt style carrier bags, to loop handled bags, to draw string trash bags; all 100% eco-friendly, home compostable and eco-friendly
Certifications
Don’t just take our word for it! All of the biomaterials that we use have been certified by a multitude of international standards organisations so you can be sure that the product you are purchasing is 100% home compostable and will biodegrade into just water and carbon dioxide! Our certifications include:
- European standard EN13432
- TÜV Austria – OK Compost
- TÜV Austria – OK Compost HOME
- American Standard ASTM D6400-2004
- Australian Standard AS4736
- Australian Standard AS5810
- ISO9001/ISO14001
