ACA hosted its first in-person meeting of its new Sustainability Workgroup in Pittsburgh, Penn., on May 15. ACA recently established the new workgroup to address a number of emerging issues in the area of sustainability and to coordinate ACA’s sustainability initiatives in response to overwhelming interest from its membership. ACA held an initial teleconference with the workgroup in March, but meeting in Pittsburgh was the first opportunity for the membership to convene to discuss the workgroup’s structure, mission, and priorities.

The topic of sustainability has been steadily growing in importance, and has quickly become not only a socially and environmentally progressive movement, but also a potentially important economic driver as well. ACA has incorporated the philosophy of sustainability into many of its existing programs and activities, including the highly successful PaintCare® program, its Green Building Workgroup, and the paint and coatings industry’s sustainability message. ACA formed the Sustainability Workgroup to address these issues under a single umbrella and to coordinate activities with other ACA committees and workgroups. While sustainability is a broad concept, the workgroup will focus its energies on a set of concrete issues that deliver the most value to the industry.

The ACA Sustainability Workgroup kick-off meeting on May 15 gave the more than 30 attendees the opportunity to discuss the direction of the workgroup and learn more about a wide range of specific issues impacting the paint and coatings industry. The meeting included topics on corporate social responsibility and sustainability reporting, highlighting the need for the membership to consider meaningful and consistent sustainability metrics that are relevant for the paint and coatings industry. The Chief of the U.S. Environmental Protection’s (EPA) Design for the Environment (DfE) branch, Clive Davies, joined the meeting to give a background on the DfE program and its safer chemicals label. Green building and sustainable design was another item on the meeting agenda.

The workgroup also discussed the role of Environmental Product Declarations in objectively communicating information regarding a product’s environmental impact throughout its entire life cycle. The workgroup decided that it was critical to develop Product Category Rules for paint and coatings to enable members to use a set of standardized rules, requirements, and guidelines for creating Environmental Product Declarations. A sub-workgroup will be tasked with exploring this issue.

The workgroup agreed to draft a sustainability charter to guide its efforts and concluded the meeting by approving a formal mission statement: The Sustainability Workgroup is committed to pursuing the principles of Sustainable Development to help the coatings industry “meet the needs of the present, without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” The Sustainability Workgroup will develop guidance and resources for the coatings industry to address today’s sustainability issues and challenges.

The next Sustainability Workgroup meeting will be held in September 2013.