Paints and coatings protect and beautify the surfaces to which they are applied and enhance the value of everything from homes and manufactured products to bridges and other structures. 

Practically every man-made product has a coating that is necessary to protect it and maintain its usefulness.  Primary categories of paints and coatings include the following:

• Architectural Coatings – These are products that can be applied by professional trade painters and “do-it-yourself” consumers” to beautify and maintain the surfaces of homes, public buildings, offices and factories.
• Industrial Coatings – These are coatings applied at the time of manufacture of products.
• Special Purpose Coatings – These include a wide array of divergent coatings that tend to be “field-applied”, as opposed to being applied in a factory setting. This segment can be divided into the following major sub-segments:
  • Automotive Refinish Coatings;
    • Industrial Maintenance Coatings;
  • Traffic Marking Paints; and
  • Marine Paints.

The Australian Paint Manufacturers’ Federation (APMF) is the industry association for the paint and coatings industry. More information on paint and surface coatings is available on their website.

The APMF provides a number of resources for the industry including:

• Painting fact sheets
• Information sheets on paint related topics
• Automotive refinishing guide
• Manual handling guide
• Graffiti

Product Stewardship

Paintback^® is a cost-effective solution for household and trade painters to remove unwanted paint and packaging and prevent it from ending up in landfill and vital waterways. Paintback^® also funds research to find better uses for unwanted paint.

Sustainability

The paint and surface coatings industry continues to be proactive in developing new products and technologies to reduce the environmental impact of the production and use of their products, such as lower VOC-containing products, in paints and inks.  There are now many examples of innovations designed to minimise energy consumption, VOC emissions, water consumption and transport, within the surface coatings industry.  Other sustainability examples include an increasing use of renewable materials, advanced recycling and waste recovery techniques and the supply of products in returnable packaging [1].