Don’t you love the smell of a fresh coat of paint? It’s like a validation of all your effort—it makes you feel like you’ve really accomplished something.
Unfortunately, science has discovered, it’s actually not very good for you. Conventional household paint contains thousands of chemicals. Make no mistake: there is nothing intrinsically wrong with chemicals. As any intelligent person knows, without chemicals, life itself would be impossible. But the fact remains that some of the combinations used in household paint aren’t good for you.
Are They Dangerous?
Some components have clearly been shown to be carcinogenic (cancer-causing), and many more cause health issues including eye irritation, nausea, headache, and can even exacerbate breathing problems such as asthma and COPD. A relationship has even been shown to such things as impaired brain function, or liver and kidney damage, particularly for commercial painters regularly exposed to the vapours.
Consequently there has been a definite shift in the market towards the use of low-VOC (volatile organic compounds), or eco-friendly paints, in Australia. Some brands even produce products called zero-VOC.
What is in paint?
All paints consist of three fundamental components: 1) pigment, 2) binders, and 3) solvent. The pigment is your colour; the binders make it attach to whatever surface you put it on; the solvent keeps it in liquid form to make it easy to apply.
Typically we blame the solvent for the VOCs because its primary function is to evaporate quickly (that’s the “volatile” part). The pigment remains behind and the binders can then grip on to the surface.
What most people don’t know is that both the pigment and the binders contain their own VOCs, and a lot of other poisonous substances besides. Years ago we eliminated lead from our paint components, but we still use other metals like chromium and cadmium in our pigments to obtain certain colours. We also include things like mould inhibitors.
As a consequence, routine inspection of homes, regardless of whether or not they have been recently painted, shows levels of VOCs 10 times higher than outdoors. Perhaps that is not entirely unexpected considering that only 50% of the VOCs from a fresh coat of paint have been released after one year. In fact, immediately after painting, VOCs reach a level 1000 times higher than outdoor air.
What can we do?
Actually a great deal has already been done. Many paint manufacturers are making a particular effort to reduce the number of VOCs in their products. Low-VOC paint is becoming the de facto choice for nearly every application nowadays.
General Motors (Holden), Ford, Mazda, and Toyota have all switched to a waterborne painting system to eliminate their contribution of VOCs to the air. On a corporate level that’s a really good choice!
As mentioned, Zero-VOC paint is readily available for almost all applications. And now, new eco-Sensitive paint makes a point of eliminating the toxic components, fostering a greater trust in the public, and keeping us all safer.
The Takeaway
Faced with the statistic that 16% of all VOCs in Australia come directly from the paint industry, second only to automobiles (the largest producer in the world, at over 60%) this move became inevitable. Brilliant chemists are working on ways to make paints mould, mildew, and pest resistant while keeping them completely nontoxic to humans and our pets (unless you have a pet mould!).
We’ve come a long way, and it’s only going to get better.