Recycling, Ink can be used for... Ink? Sep 13, 2011 16:23 by Mike Derges

Lexmark has announced that they’ve received the first shipment of their latest ink dispensing product, no it’s not a new fancy cartridge it’s the latest in planet saving stationary.In collaboration with cartridge recycling firm Close the Loop, who operate out of Northern Kentucky and Australia, the printing giant has released a new model of the design that was released in 2010.

According to John Gagel, sustainability manager at Lexmark, “It’s a completely new design that’s more functional. The ink flow is better than the classic roller-ball design we had first.” But the improvements don’t just impact the writing ability. “All of the plastic in the pen is recycled, as is 94% of all materials in it.”

One of the fantastic advances is that Lexmark have been able to recycle some of their ink into this pen. This feat has previously proved problematic so this could be a groundbreaking step.

Currently Lexmark are giving away the pens to customers and selling them from their store. Close the Loop have teamed up with AusPen (in Australia of course) to sell overseas.

Going green is very important to Lexmark, one of four companies that are helped software company SAP produce technology to track the sustainability performance .
They also have a claim to be the only printer manufacturer with a closed loop approach ie they reuse old products in the production of new ones.
Lexmark even manage to reuse 10% of their laser toner cartridges and they also offer a system called the Lexmark Return Program where they offer a discount to customers who return used ink cartridges.

Here in the office a certain member of staff was suggesting taking bets on how many pens they could make from the failing Lexmark printheads debacle.