PITTSBURGH – PPG is celebrating the 50^th anniversary of DURANAR^® coatings throughout 2017, commemorating the introduction in 1967 of one of the industry’s first high-performance polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) coatings for metal building components.

Over the past half-century, Duranar coatings have been specified by renowned architects to protect and enhance some of the world’s most recognized architectural landmarks, such as the Empire State Building in New York, the Louvre Pyramid in Paris, Shanghai World Financial Center in China, Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.

PPG has continually refined Duranar coatings since their introduction to meet evolving aesthetic, performance and sustainability demands of architects and buildings owners. Significant advances have included adding metallic flakes and other effects for expanded appearance options; incorporating ULTRA-COOL^® infrared-reflective pigments to help reduce building-cooling loads; and formulating Duranar powder coatings, which earned PPG a prestigious R&D 100 Award recognizing the coatings’ ability to reduce VOC emissions and economize production of custom-colored powder coatings.

Brian Knapp, PPG Director, Coil and Building Products, said Duranar coatings have been popular with generations of architects and building owners for their ideal blend of aesthetics, reliability and performance. “Duranar coatings can be formulated to provide an extensive range of colors and effects, giving architects a virtually unlimited design palette,” he said. “They also feature unique chemistry developed and refined by PPG that has delivered decades of color retention and chalk and chemical resistance, even in the most challenging seacoast and industrial environments.”

Duranar coatings are formulated with proprietary PPG resins and pigments in combination with standard KYNAR 500^® or HYLAR^® 5000 PVDF resins. In fact, PPG helped popularize and improve PVDF coatings technology by becoming one of the first companies to license Kynar 500 resin, which was originally commercialized by Pennwalt Corp. in the mid-1960s. PPG remains the only original and continuous licensee of this PVDF resin, which has become an industry standard.

More significantly, PPG’s exclusive formulation for Duranar coatings creates powerful molecular bonds that render the material almost impervious to the effects of continuous ultraviolet (UV) exposure, as well as other environmental and atmospheric hazards such as salt air, humidity, high temperatures and acid rain. In fact, many of the original trial panels coated with Duranar products PPG developed 50 years ago are still enduring exposure testing in South Florida today.

As part of the anniversary celebration, PPG will highlight Duranar coatings in trade-show displays throughout the year, offering special customer promotions and giveaways. PPG also will introduce a dedicated web portal featuring images and descriptions of landmark buildings finished with Duranar coatings, as well as articles, white papers and other educational materials.

To learn more about the 50^th anniversary of Duranar coatings, visit www.duranar50.com.