Cut Pollution and Landfill Expansion with Whiteboard Paint

Premium whiteboard paint offers an easy way to help you address two of today’s top environmental problems: pollution of our planet’s air, land, and water by toxic chemicals and the constant expansion of landfills. No matter what materials it’s made of, every whiteboard produced today leaves a substantial environmental footprint. From the first stages of production to the time they end up in landfills, whiteboards create serious ecological issues for Earth.

To alleviate this problem, you can choose an alternative to conventional whiteboards that’s both long-lasting and eco-friendly – top-quality whiteboard paint. In this blog post, we’ll examine the powerful environmental effects of two common types of whiteboards: melamine-coated fiberboard and porcelain enamel-coated steel. We’ll also show how whiteboard painted walls provide ideal substitutes for these potent environmental hazards. Choosing whiteboard paint over traditional whiteboards will give you a superior writing surface and a clear conscience about your impact on our planet.

1. Melamine-coated fiberboard whiteboards

Today, most whiteboards used in schools, homes, businesses, and other venues consist of medium-density fiberboard (MDF) substrates coated with melamine. MDF  contains sawdust and wood shavings bound together with glue.

Downsides of fiberboard substrates

The glue used to bind the sawdust and wood shavings in MDF is typically formaldehyde-based. For this reason, it contains toxic chemicals called volatile organic compounds (VOCs). VOCs are extremely damaging to human health and the natural environment and contribute greatly to air, water, and soil pollution. MDF also requires extensive processing to produce.

Besides being toxic, the glue used in MDF contaminates the wood-based materials, making recycling impossible. So, when melamine-coated fiberboard whiteboards reach the end of their useful lives, which is often be just two years, they’re tossed into landfills. There, they continue to release VOCs that leach into the surrounding soil and enter the air, wreaking havoc on the environment for many decades.

Comparison with whiteboard paint

In contrast, the manufacturing process used to make premium whiteboard paint generates only negligible amounts of VOCs. This is also true for whiteboard paint’s application and drying process. Top-quality whiteboard paint requires just 48 hours to dry and is then ready to use, without fear of breathing in any harmful VOCs. The paint’s extremely short dry time is due to its outstanding eco-friendly water-based formula. The formula allows for a safe, easy, virtually odor-free application, and also provides quick evaporation of the liquid component.

Drawbacks of melamine coatings

Besides the damaging impact of their MDF substrates, the surface layer of melamine-coated whiteboards is also hazardous. In fact, the European non-profit group Health and Environment Alliance says that melamine deserves government regulation due to its harmful effects on health and the environment. That’s why Germany has proposed designating melamine as a substance of extremely high concern. This places melamine on the black list of harmful chemicals to be phased out of use in the European Union.

What’s more, the surfaces of melamine whiteboards are easily worn down, discolored, and weakened by regular contact with dry erase marker ink. Over time, the strong chemical binders in the ink penetrate and wear away the melamine. This leads to a gray, dingy look that can never be eliminated.

When this happens, the boards are no longer useful and are either thrown out or repurposed by applying whiteboard paint.  As mentioned above, throwing the boards out adds massive amounts of non-biodegradable waste to our landfills. This, in turn, causes greenhouse gases to be emitted for years, thus damaging the earth and impacting human health.

Whiteboard paint provides a practical solution

An easy solution to this problem is to apply premium whiteboard paint to your walls for a trouble-free, eco-friendly, highly durable writing surface. The non-toxic ingredients in top-quality whiteboard paint include virtually no VOCs. In fact, the product contains less than 0.5% of VOCs per unit volume. This feature has led Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) to recognize premium whiteboard paint as an eco-friendly wall coating.

LEED is a global green construction certification system that was started by the United States Green Building Council (USGBC). The fact that top-quality whiteboard paint meets LEED’s stringent requirements for eco-friendly coatings has many benefits. It means that when architects, contractors, or others who construct buildings choose to apply whiteboard paint, they earn points toward having their structures certified by LEED. LEED certification, in turn, means owners can greatly reduce their energy and water consumption and lower their operating costs.

So, when you install whiteboard paint, you avoid the damaging impact of producing and using melamine whiteboards, and of discarding them in landfills. You also act in accord with LEED’s high environmental standards and help safeguard our planet.

2. Porcelain Enamel Whiteboards

As with melamine-coated whiteboards, the chemicals that go into making porcelain enamel whiteboards are highly toxic. Besides, making porcelain boards consumes huge amounts of energy. These factors contribute to their high cost and damaging impact on the environment. Such whiteboards may last longer than melamine-coated fiberboard whiteboards, but producing them takes a serious toll on our planet and health.

A complex and environmentally harmful production process

Porcelain enamel whiteboards are heated in kilns to join their enameling material to their steel substrates. This material, called frit, is a mixture of highly hazardous chemicals. During production, the frit is sprayed onto the substrate and fired in a kiln at about 1,380 to 1,560 degrees Fahrenheit. Then a second coat of frit is applied on top of the first to create a smooth, glossy finish. All of these steps are energy-intensive and add to the high cost of porcelain enamel whiteboards.

Energy expenditure upsets ecological balance

The most critical environmental concern related to porcelain enamel whiteboard manufacture is its unsustainable energy footprint. The reasons are as follows:

Heavy reliance on burning fossil fuels

The firing process, which is critical to producing porcelain enamel whiteboards, relies heavily on the consumption of fossil fuels. Kilns or ovens are typically powered by natural gas, a significant source of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane.

Extremely high energy consumption

The high temperatures used to fire porcelain enamel whiteboards require a tremendous amount of energy to be consumed in a short period of time.

Environmental Impact

The quantity of energy spent to produce porcelain enamel whiteboards has multiple direct and indirect environmental effects:

• Greenhouse Gas Emissions

As mentioned, fossil fuels, especially natural gas, contribute greatly to the greenhouse gases released by making ceramic products like porcelain enamel whiteboards. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that the ceramics industry causes approximately 1% of all global CO₂ emissions. This is an astounding figure for a sector often omitted from sustainability studies.

• Resource Depletion

Also, the extraction of raw materials and the energy needed to make porcelain enamel whiteboards play a part in resource depletion. Mining for clay, quartz, and the other porcelain ingredients disturbs local ecosystems and causes long-term environmental damage.

• Waste Generation

Apart from the energy consumed, making porcelain enamel whiteboards generates massive quantities of waste, such as kiln debris, surplus glaze, and damaged products, all of which end up in landfills. In addition, the firing process releases strong pollutants like sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides into the air, contributing to poor air quality in the area around the factory and beyond.

Whiteboard paint comes to the rescue

In light of the many environmental drawbacks possessed by both melamine-coated fiberboard whiteboards and porcelain enamel-coated whiteboards, many people are looking for an affordable alternative. Using whiteboard paint to create a writing surface for your home, classroom, or business is a no-brainer. Doing so will assure you of a high-quality, attractive, eco-friendly, and easy-to-erase writing canvas that’s guaranteed to last for ten or more years of continuous service with normal use and regular maintenance.

Summary

Article Name

Cut Pollution and Landfill Expansion with Whiteboard Paint

Description

Reduce landfill waste and pollution by choosing eco-friendly whiteboard paint. Transform walls while protecting the environment!

Author

Susan Anspach

Publisher Name

ReMARKable Whiteboard Paint

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