The Valspar Corp.'s board of directors authorized the repurchase of up to 2 million shares of the company's outstanding common stock, or 3% of the total of outstanding shares, over a 12-month period.
The Dow Chemical Co. and its affiliated companies in Europe announced the full resumption of acrylates production operations in Boehlen, Germany, and Clear Lake, Texas, where equipment failures caused sudden, unplanned outages in September.
Rohm and Haas Co. said it has received a $3.75-million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy's Industrial Technologies Program to develop new polymer technologies designed to reduce by as much as 30% the raw materials used to manufacture a variety of paint and coatings.
The EPA's recently published 2004 "Sector Strategies Performance Report" recognizes significant environmental progress made by the paint and coatings industry in the areas of reduced air emissions and environmental-management programs.
Bayer MaterialScience AG announces the start of construction of polyurethane and coatings raw materials production plants near Shanghai, with the plants scheduled to begin production in 2006.
DSM Eternal Resins, Kunshan, China, announced plans for a production expansion for polyester powder-coatings resins, with new capacity expected to go on stream in the second half of 2005.
Sico Inc. has sold its 50% stake in the Sico-Becker joint venture business to its European partner, Becker Industrie S.A., in a move Sico said reflects a plan to boost profits and focus on the North American market.
With some variations, a group of five Mid-Atlantic states and the District of Columbia have finalized stringent new VOC regulations on architectural and industrial maintenance coatings, with a set of VOC limits as low as 100 grams per liter scheduled to go into effect Jan. 1.