Dow To Burn Landfill Methane To Make Carpet Latex
Dalton, GA, November 7, 2007--Dow Chemical Company has begun construction on a project that will pipe methane gas, a renewable energy, from a local landfill to its latex manufacturing site in Dalton, Georgia.
There, Dow will soon produce latex carpet backing manufactured with Lomax technology.
“In the manufacturing of our latexes, our target will be to replace nearly all the fossil fuel required to manufacture latex with methane gas that would otherwise be emitted into the atmosphere,”
Lomax technology will use approximately 240 billion Btu annually of methane gas, which is equivalent to the amount of energy required to heat 2,100 homes annually. Carpet backing manufactured with Lomax technology will reduce CO2 emissions by more than 27 million pounds annually – which is comparable to keeping 2,300 cars off the road each year, Dow said.
Carpet backing products manufactured with the Dow technology will be eligible to receive points under the renewable energy section of the new NSF carpet sustainability standard. They also meet Green Label Plus requirements. In addition, Lomax Technology could help qualify for an additional LEED points under the Innovation and Design Process category.