Life cycle environmental assessment of paint processes

The environmental impact of three different automotive paint scenarios: (a) solventborne primer-waterborne basecoat-solventborne clearcoat, (b) powder primer-waterborne basecoat-solventborne clearcoat, and (c) powder primer-waterborne basecoat-powder clearcoat were investigated. Scenarios (a) and (b) are in production by the U.S. automotive industry and scenario (c) is a potential future goal. The scenarios modeled assume a greenfield plant, considering a mid-size sport utility vehicle that is painted in two separate colors. A complete life cycle analysis of the materials and processes was carried out using commercial state-of-art software. The analysis showed that a transition from solvent-based to powder-based coatings for the primer and clearcoat leads to an improvement in the environmental performance of the paint processes. The decrease in total energy consumption, water usage, and sludge generation is 22%, 34%, and 27%, respectively. The paint scenario comprised of powder primer-waterborne basecoat-powder clearcoat will minimize the environmental impacts of the painting processes for all the metrics examined in this study.