18 December 2006 - ILVA Polimeri - active for 60 years in responsible technologies for wood coatings - won the second edition of the "Product Stewardship Prize". This is an important award promoted by Federchimica, aimed at encouraging companies participating in the Responsible Care Programme, to responsibly manage their products and to ensure the respect of safety, health and environment during the entire life cycle of the products.

The "Product Stewardship Prize" was established as part of the Responsible Care International Programme, which promotes among the member chemical companies, the implementation of principles and behaviour regarding the Safety and Health of Employees, Environmental Protection, and a commitment to communicate the results, for on-going, significant, and tangible improvement.

ILVA Polimeri, as ever attentive and sensitive to the problems of the environment and of ecology, has participated in the programme since 1992.

The Jury decided to award the prize to ILVA Polimeri for Poliallilico®, a technologically innovative coating product, because it contains resins free of Styrene, a solvent commonly used in the wood furnishing elements industry, which is part of the class of solvents defined as harmful and classified by IARC (International cancer research centre) as potentially cancerogenic.
The Poliallilico® project was considered particularly good among the projects presented by the competing companies, due to its innovative formulation, which, thanks to its very low solvent content and the absence of compounds such as Styrene, guarantees a residue emissions content much lower than that of traditional products on the market, offering more safety for the applicator, for the user of the furniture item and for the environment.

Poliallilico® is a product which is part of the "Indoor Project" with which ILVA Polimeri is committed to create products with minimum impact on dwellings and to disseminate the results of its studies, by notifying them to the specialised public, to the media and to end-users.

The prize plate was personally handed over by Federchimica chairman, Giorgio Squinzi, at the Milan premises of Federchimica, to Fausto Maggioni, General and Managing Diector, Dario Nichetti, Technical Manager and Antonino Taormina, Head of the ILVA Polimeri Research Laboratories.

"The Product Stewardship Prize - said Fausto Maggioni - is for ILVA Polimeri a significant recognition of the many years of research and endeavour aimed at respecting safety and the quest of quality.
We are particularly happy that this prize was assigned to us on the sixtieth anniversary of ILVA Polimeri, to crown a tradition and philosophy extending from the establishment of the company.
We believe that having formulated a coating product which did not exist before, useful and safe for users, customers and for the environment is a small but significant result in the sphere of responsible technologies which the Prize intends to promote".

Enclosure: a data-sheet describing the winning product: Poliallilico®

Poliallilico® is a new technology of paint products containing innovative resins, which offers technical performance greater than that of traditional polystyrenes, and is free of monomer styrene and residual emissions.

Enamel paint systems for MDF commonly use direct gloss polyester base coats, usually white in colour, known as polystyrenes.

These products are suitable for paint cycles with gloss finishes because they offer toughness, sandability, resistance to shrinkage and high adhesive power on flat surfaces and edges.

Polyester-based products contain styrene monomer: a solvent commonly used in industry and classed as a hazardous substance. The IARC (International Agency for Research on Cancer) classes it as potentially carcinogenic.
But as consumers become increasingly aware of health and safety issues, styrene monomer has come to be considered a substance to be avoided. Therefore, to offer consumers products which are safe for use, the major international furniture manufacturers - especially those in northern Europe - have totally eliminated styrene monomer from their products.

Poliallilico technology: high-tech performance and safety

As a company with a long tradition in research in paint technology which is safe for the environment, the user and the consumer, ILVA Polimeri is proud to announce Poliallilico®: an innovative polyallyl-based product free of styrene.
To obtain the same technical and performance characteristics of polystyrenes, we adopted innovative Poliallilico® resins.

Resin properties:
very high solid residue
minimum solvent content
excellent surface toughness and chemical-physical resistance
high dimensional stability

In order to optimise and characterise performances, ILVA Polimeri ran a series of technical tests on Poliallilico® for which the following certification is available :

colourfastness to Italian standard UNI 9427/89
cold check resistance to Italian standard UNI 9429 / 89
adhesion testing to standard ISO 2409/94
gel time
drying
sandability
film yellowing resistance after application with white polyurethane gloss.

While the technical and applicative performances of Poliallilico® are better than those of traditional preparation products used for painting on wood, in terms of harmfulness and safety, Poliallilico® is characterised by a substantial reduction of solvent emissions, compared to polyurethane technology products, and by a harmfulness considerably lower than the traditional polystyrenes containing styrene. It offers more safety for end-users, users of the furniture and for the environment.

Another feature of Poliallilico® is low substrate emissions - here too its beats white polystyrene.

As shown in CATAS test reports 45490/1 and 45491/1, emissions from Poliallilico® 24 hours after application are around 1/3 of those measured for conventional polystyrene. And after 28 days emissions are only 1/5 of those measured for polystyrene.
Total emissions 24 hours after application are already under the limits imposed by DGM (650 micrograms per m2 per m3 per 24 hours).

Due to its innovative formula ILVA Polimeri's Poliallilico® meets all the key international specifications for furniture manufacturing, which require products free of aromatic solvents and styrene monomer.