A carbon neutrality program for silicone materials used for structural glazing, insulating glass and weather sealing designed to help the building industry cut emissions has been announced by Dow.
The program will include some of the company’s DOWISL materials, which will have PAS 2060 certified carbon certificates from Dow’s backward integrated siloxane productions and carbon reduction investments.
The company says carbon neutral silicones can eliminate the carbon needed to produce the polymers that are the base of Dow’s products. Dow says carbon neutral technology is advancing in the industry, especially for the silicone metal manufacturing process.
Silicone is important to the building and construction industry because it has long-term use potential, Dow says, as well as a smaller carbon footprint that can equip buildings with improved energy performance with improved emissions.
According to the World Green Building Council, the industry contributes about 39% of the world’s carbon emissions. The council recently updated it’s Net Zero Carbon Buildings Commitment and appealed to the construction industry to invest in net zero goals and to practice sustainable construction and building operations.
As part of that update, the WorldGBC says by the start of 2023 businesses and organizations will also be required to account for the lifecycle impact of all new buildings and major renovations by stating that they are efficient, powered by renewable energy and use the maximum reductions in carbon emissions.
Dow says the energy use of these products is low in applications such as prefabricated façade components and glass insulation, which helps improve the energy efficiency in buildings. Additionally, Dow says they can last more than 50 years.
Silicone sealants can conserve up to 20 times more energy than what is needed to produce them for insulated class, according to the Global Silicones Council.
The Dow products can contribute to international green building certificates, the company says, and each one will have an environmental product declaration that provides information and transparency about the lifetime impact of the product.
Dow will commercially release the materials in 2022.