Enviroline Group is building out a network of representatives and licensees in several key Latin American countries with the goal of adding 25% to its undisclosed U.S. sales within the next year, said Teresa Valdes, the Latin America and Caribbean manager for the Pompano Beach, FL-based company.

Representatives have already been established in Mexico, Puerto Rico, Ecuador and Peru. Several of these representatives may take on a sub-regional role in distribution until additional country representatives are selected, she said. Talks are underway with potential representatives in Chile and Costa Rica, and with a potential licensee in Argentina, she added.

Enviroline specializes in high-performance solvent-free, ultra high solids epoxy technology for tank and pipeline applications, with coatings of up to 150 mils that cure in hours. In contrast, the current industry standard involves solvent-based systems that require two coats and several weeks to cure, Valdes said.

While Enviroline services about 40 different industries, its core clientele to date is in the petroleum refinery industry, in which the company is one of the top five players, she said.

In Latin America, given the generally smaller scale of industrial installations, Enviroline expects to find strong demand from the food and beverage industries. “Ours is the only lining in the market which is NSF approved for immersion service overnight,” she said.

Among key benefits to the Enviroline system is minimized down-time, Valdes suggested. “Our technology is more cost effective because we cut down-time by 75% or more. “While our coating can be done in one day, with our competitors’ systems, a contractor may wait a week in between coats, then another week for the second coat to cure, so you can have a team involved for 20 days,” she said.

The company also expects to find applications in municipal drinking water and waste water systems in Latin America that are characterized by both small scale and advanced age. “Because of hurricanes and old infrastructure, everyone has old water tanks or cisterns that now need to be lined,” said Valdes.

In Mexico, Enviroline’s distributor is Grupo Beton de Mexico S.A., based in Monterrey. In Puerto Rico, the distributor is Puerto Rico Wire, based in Bayamon. In Ecuador and Peru, independent sales representatives are Fredy Andrade, in Quito, and Julio Medina, in Lima, respectively.

Apart from the new Latin America network, privately-owned Enviroline’s Pompano Beach manufacturing base is served by U.S. warehouses in California, New Jersey and Texas. In Canada, Cloverdale Paint is Enviroline’s distributor under a five-year agreement. A San Francisco, CA-based representative of Cetex serves the South Korea market.