Sherwin Williams Major marine coatings project

The company

Sherwin Williams was founded more than 145 years ago and operating from almost 4,000 locations worldwide, is now working with Element's coatings division to test a number of marine coatings at the development stage.

The US-based company is a global protective and marine coatings company offering a complete line of high performance coatings and systems to combat corrosion, supported by the largest group of NACE-certified coatings inspectors in the industry.

The challenge

Element was contracted by paint and coatings giant Sherwin-Williams to provide support on a key marine project.

The solution

Element tested the products to the two key International Maritime Organization (IMO) performance standards for protective coatings, resolutions MSC.215(82) and MSC.288(87). These provide minimum standards for protective marine coatings used in both ballast tanks and cargo oil tanks.

MSC.215(82) is the performance standard for protective coatings for dedicated seawater ballast tanks in all types of ships. MSC.288(87) is the standard providing technical requirements for the minimum standard for protective coatings to be applied in cargo oil tanks during the construction of new crude oil tankers. Both standards are vital to the construction of ships, setting out the requirements to which the protective coatings used must adhere.

Element carried out this key testing for nine months in what was a significant investment for Sherwin-Williams.