Green printing: it's not just a color, it's an attitude.

• Author: Kaelbe, Steve
• Position: Environmental conciousness in the printing industry

In the printing industry these days, green is more than just a mixture of yellow and blue inks. The green that's on the minds of a lot of printers, their customers and the government is the green that means saving the environment.

"I believe that as far as the country is concerned, environmental awareness was created in the '80s, and environmental compliance will take place in the '90s," says Robert Shepard, president of Shepard Poorman Communications in Indianapolis, one of a number of Indiana printers becoming more attuned to the realities of green printing. Shepard and other printers believe it's best to make environmental improvements now, before the government makes them mandatory.

Environmental laws affecting printers "have been changing in the last five to 10 years, and are continuing to change," acknowledges Larry Brankle, president of Ad Craft Printers in Merrillville. "It's added to the cost of doing business."

One way costs have been affected has to do with disposal of inks and other chemicals used in the printing process, Brankle says. "We have to dispose of waste a lot differently, with licensed disposal units."

"You can't just throw stuff away anymore. You have to use proper disposal methods," agrees Eric Petersen, chairman and CEO of Petersen Graphics Group in South Bend. But, he adds, the cost increase isn't all that great for most printers because using disposal methods now considered proper is nothing new. "We basically always got rid of things that way anyway."

Interestingly, inks and solvents are not as much a part of the public's environmental dialogue as other issues, but they are of major concern to printers. Inks are considered a hazardous material because traditionally their oil base has come from petroleum products. These inks produce what are known as volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, which are materials that get into the air and create smog. Chemicals used to clean presses and make printing plates may contain materials that would damage the environment if not disposed of properly. And while the so-called "fountain solution" that is a critical part of the offset-printing process is mostly water, printers have had to thin the solution with isopropyl alcohol, which environmentalists and the government don't want to see dumped in large quantities.

The short-term solution, already mentioned above, is to make sure such hazardous materials are handled and disposed of properly. Besides having qualified people cart off...