The Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD) is the public agency entrusted with regulating stationary sources of air pollution in the nine counties that surround San Francisco Bay: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, southwestern Solano, and southern Sonoma counties. Recently, the BAAQMD has revised their regulations and here is a review for Regulation 8, Rule 3: Architectural Coatings, which originally took effect in 1978.
Significant changes to the regulation were implemented on 1/1/2011, which included lowering the maximum allowable VOC for a majority of the product categories, adding a few new product categories, and implementing new requirements for container labeling.
Examples of the lower VOCs include:
Bituminous Roof Coatings: Was 300 g/L – now 50 g/L.
Primers, Sealers and Undercoaters: Was 200 g/L – now 100 g/L
Concrete/Masonry Sealers*: 100 g/L
Driveway Sealer*: 50 g/L
*New Product Category
Container labeling requirements include:
The container labels for faux finishing coatings, reactive penetrating sealers, stone consolidants, wood coatings, and zinc rich primers must prominently display a statement that identifies the coating as described in the rule (see section 8-3-401.10 – 401.14).
Multi-component coating container labels must display the coating VOC content as mixed or catalyzed.
For coatings that contain silanes, siloxanes, or other ingredients that generate ethanol or other VOCs during the curing process, the VOC content displayed on the container label must include the VOCs emitted during curing.
Each coating container subject to this rule is required to display the date the coating was manufactured or a date code representing that date on the label, lid, or bottom of the container.
In addition to the 1/1/2011 requirements noted above, there will be another amendment to the BAAQMD regulation that will take effect on 1/1/2012. The 2012 amendment will lower the maximum allowable VOC content for following categories only:
Rust Preventative Coatings: Now 400 g/L – will be 250 g/L
Specialty Primers, Sealers, and Undercoaters: Now 350 g/L – will be 100 g/L
[Although the 2012 changes will not directly affect W. R. MEADOWS (we do not manufacture products covered by these two categories), we wanted to provide this information for your review.]
BAAQMD has also added the following disclaimer, which applies to the current regulation, as well as to the 1/1/2012 amendment:
Note: Coatings manufactured before the effective dates noted above may be sold for three (3) years after the deadline, provided they comply with the prior VOC content limits, and they may be used until consumed.
W. R. MEADOWS would like to assure our customers that all of our products manufactured and sold in the BAAQMD meet ALL regulation 8 VOC and container labeling requirements, including the current 2011 and future 2012 amendments.
And, if you would like further information regarding VOC content rules, our products, and their compliancy, please visit our VOC-compliance map.
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To contact your local W. R. MEADOWS representative or for general correspondence, please click here. If you need immediate assistance, please call (800) 342-5976. Thank you!