In recent years, environmental protection has become a global focus, with government-led plastic reduction policies marking a turning point for the industry. These policies aim to reduce single-use plastic products, such as banning free plastic bags, restricting disposable tableware, and requiring simplified packaging in the food industry. Many countries have launched similar initiatives, focusing on: reducing single-use plastics, restricting disposable tableware, and promoting simplified packaging design.

For manufacturers of plastic tableware and storage boxes that rely heavily on injection molding, these policies represent both pressure and opportunities for accelerated transformation.

Taiwan’s unique “bubble tea culture” further highlights the urgency of environmental needs. According to the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA), Taiwanese people consume over 1 billion cups of bubble tea annually. The resulting consumption of cups, straws, and sealing films is astonishing. Promoting reusable cups and recyclable material containers could significantly reduce plastic waste and directly benefit the environment. However, such transformation poses major challenges for injection molding and food container manufacturers:

• Increased raw material costs: Introducing recyclable or bio-based materials (e.g., PLA) raises material and R&D expenses. However, the cost difference varies depending on material source, recycling systems, and order volumes.

• Higher process complexity: Recycled materials usually have narrower molding windows (different flowability, moisture absorption, and thermal stability). Achieving stable yield requires adjustments to molding parameters, drying procedures, and mold design.
• Market pressure: Passing all costs to consumers would hurt short-term demand. Instead, strategies may include: shared costs (subsidies or discounts), consumer incentives for reusable cups (price cuts, reward points), or differentiated branding to gain consumer acceptance.

Thus, enhancing the environmental performance of plastic packaging containers—while maintaining efficiency and quality—has become a key industry issue.

How to Improve the Environmental Performance of Plastic Packaging Containers

1.  Raw Material Improvements

• Increase the use of recyclable materials (e.g., recycled PET, recycled PP), and establish stable formulations and supply chains.
• Develop bio-based plastics: corn starch, sugarcane, and PLA (polylactic acid) can partially replace petrochemical plastics for disposable tableware, packaging, and medical consumables.

2. Recycling and Reuse

• Recycle production scrap and defective products into re-pelletized material.
• Introduce hot runner systems to significantly reduce sprue waste, while evaluating mold modification costs and quality control requirements.

3. Process Optimization

• Apply thin-wall molding to reduce material use per piece while maintaining structural strength.
• Utilize micro-foaming injection molding by injecting gas into plastic, reducing weight and material usage by approximately 10–30%.

Automation (Robotic Arm) Solutions

Under the plastic reduction trend, achieving higher efficiency with fewer workers is critical for maintaining competitiveness. Linear robotic arms offer significant advantages:

Under the plastic reduction trend, achieving higher efficiency with fewer workers is critical for maintaining competitiveness. Linear robotic arms offer significant advantages:

1. Automatic Product Removal

Thin-walled bottle preforms are difficult to remove. Customized end-of-arm tooling (vacuum suction or multi-point gripping, depending on the shape of cups/tableware) ensures safe product handling, reducing deformation or dropping risks.

• Advantages:：To shorten product removal time, lightweight aluminum ST robotic models are applied, optimizing the cycle time to within 10 seconds, significantly improving machine utilization.

For high-speed demands such as aviation cups, HA high-speed robotic models can achieve removal cycles as fast as 5 seconds.

• Automatic removal prevents deformation or damage caused by excessive preform temperature.

2.  Automatic Gate Cutting, Trimming, and Product Assembly

For multi-cavity disposable tableware production, robotic arms combined with automated trimming machines can remove gates and burrs, eliminating errors and risks from manual trimming. The process can then be extended to assembly, stacking, and packaging, creating a one-stop production line.

• Reduces reliance on manual trimming, lowering labor demand.
• Improves consistency in product appearance.
• Suitable for mass production and multi-cavity molds.
• Enables continuous production lines and reduces manual handling.

Customer Issues and Improvement Methods in the Plastics Industry