Want to reduce your pollution footprint while speeding up plate production? Chemistry-free or processless plates can do just that.

By Bob Atkinson

Processless Violet Plates

This year the market will change. Some of the larger plate companies will be showing a brand-new category at Drupa 2008: processless violet plates. This technology offers all of the usual advantages of conventional violet plates—faster imaging, much lower power consumption, suitability for fairly long press runs (100,000+ impressions) and excellent image quality—combined with the elimination of conventional plate processing and the time, floor space and environmental issues associated with it. This technology has been in development (and rumor) for about five years, but 2008 seems to be the year it will actually come to market.