International Paint Ltd. has been awarded the first Lloyd’s Register IMO PSPC (Performance Standard for Protective Coatings) Type Approval Certificate for its Intershield 300—an abrasion resistant, aluminum pure epoxy coating.
“We have always supported the introduction of a standard that would help increase the service life of coatings for seawater ballast tanks and directly contribute to improved safety of life at sea,” said Mike Hindmarsh, worldwide marine business development manager, International Paint. “We’re particularly pleased that the first Lloyd’s Register Certificate has been awarded to our premium anticorrosive, Intershield 300 and are confident that with a proven, twenty year track record on over 5,600 vessels, this product will continue to provide the very highest levels of newbuilding productivity and in service performance”.
The PSPC and the Type Approval Certification process places new responsibilities on coatings manufacturers to ensure that all coatings designed for use in dedicated seawater ballast tanks in all types of ships and double side skin spaces of bulk carriers, meet strict performance requirements. To comply, coatings must either pass stringent laboratory testing or be subjected to inspection and confirmation that the coating has provided a minimum of five years ‘Good’ in service performance or that the coating has existing B1 Marintek approval. In addition to this, the coatings manufacturer must meet the approved supplier criteria for each supply location as set out in IACS UR Z17 and PR34. This includes the provision that if the manufacturer makes coatings in different locations under the same product name then infrared identification shall be used to demonstrate that the coating is of the same high quality and specification.
Only if these requirements are met will Lloyd’s Register issue Type Approval Certification.