Conventional paint, Thames said, contains volatile organic compounds (VOCs), which pollute the air and give fresh paint its unpleasant odor. The new technology developed at Southern Miss will remove the VOCs from the paint, cutting the level of pollutants from, typically, 200-400 grams per liter of paint to as low as three grams.
"The bottom line is this technology uses castor oil, soybean oil or lesquerella oil to allow us to make latex polymers that have wide applications," Thames said. "Not just paints, but inks, adhesives, carpet backings, coating for fibers, coatings for concrete steel, just a huge potential for applications. And we can make these coating systems that have no odor and release no pollutants into the atmosphere."
Despite its environmentally friendly makeup, the paint has shown a consistently high quality in lab tests, including government testing as a precursor to environmental certification and U.S. Defense Department approval, Thames said.
"According to the specifications called for by the Green Seal Society, our (paint) far exceeded their expectations -- in terms of the amount of volatiles in it, in terms of the odor, the washability, the scrub-resistance values. It meets the required Green Seal specifications according to an independent lab. Application for Green Seal certification is in progress."
In addition to meeting high standards, the paint will be a money-saver for the Pentagon and, by extension, U.S. taxpayers, Billak said.
"Since the paint has no VOCs, there is no downtime in painting," he said. "We repaint every
five years, and by using this paint, we won't have to shut down
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Contact: Bud Kirkpatarick
bud.kirkpatrick@usm.edu
601-266-4491
University of Southern Mississippi
19-Feb-2002