Demand for Low-VOC Coatings Continues to Rise

Paint and coatings producers are continually improving their processes to comply with the increasing number of regulatory policies enforced by various governments. The products that fail to meet these legal requirements are not allowed in the countries that have these strict environmental regulations, especially in many countries in Western Europe and the North America region.

The low-VOC coatings market is projected to grow from USD 89 billion in 2019 to USD 120 billion by 2024, at a CAGR of 6.0% during the forecast period. Waterborne, powder and radiation cure technologies are the major low-VOC coating technologies, and are thus gaining in popularity. Many cleaner technologies also reduce paint waste by improving the transfer efficiency of the coating to the substrate.

Waterborne coatings held 82% of the market, in terms of value, in 2019. The market for conventional solventborne coatings has lost its long-running dominance due to the growing use of solvent-free coatings and increasing awareness regarding the harmful effects of VOC emissions on the environment. The shift from solventborne to waterborne coatings has been a trend that is mostly seen in the decorative/architectural coatings segment. The increasing demand for green products has also created the need for supplies of green raw materials for coatings, most notably, waterborne resins such as alkyd, acrylic and epoxy. For instance, advances in waterborne alkyd technologies have enabled the production of virtually zero-VOC alkyd resins with the same performance as that of solventborne alkyds.

Low-VOC coatings market size, by technology

Waterborne technology uses water as a solvent, which makes it environment friendly and easy to apply. In most cases, this technology uses 80% water, with small quantities of other solvents, for instance, glycol ethers. This technology is widely adopted for architectural, automotive, wood, marine and packaging applications. The binders used for waterborne coatings can be either polyacrylate polyvinyl ethers, polyurethane, epoxy or alkyd resins. The quality and strength of waterborne coatings depends on the raw materials used since their chemical compositions differ.

Today in many applications, consumer demand for environment-friendly products has created a significant impact on the product value and innovation of low-VOC coating technologies. Users of low-VOC coatings want products that provide similar functionality, better weather resistance, high performance, reduced maintenance costs, improved productivity and increased service life, along with ease of application and easy cleaning as compared to solventborne coatings. An increase in demand for such low-VOC technologies has, therefore, aided innovations by coatings manufacturers.