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Aussie firm leads breakthrough in timber coating technology

Brisbane commercialisation company PPK has made another breakthrough with a product that it claims had the potential to address problems in global building markets worth billions.

The company, along with its partner Deakin University, said relatively small amounts of white graphene had made significant improvements in paints and polymers that included water resistance, wear resistance and in anti-bacterial responses.

PPK executive chairman Robin Levison said the total addressable market for the product was massive and could be introduced into products at relatively low cost.

He said the key finding was how little white graphene was needed to make the improvements.

White graphene is also being tested for its use in the hydrogen industry where it is believed to have the ability to improve the durability of metals used in its storage and transport.

“We are only at the beginning of where it might be introduced in industrial applications like hydrogen,” Levison said.

“We are extremely happy with the results. It could not have gone better given the minimal amount of white graphene we have introduced to improve them. This is taking a newly developed nanotechnology into a very large market and showing improvements.”

He said the improvements would apply to timber coatings.

The tests also found the wear resistance of epoxy flooring improve by 52 per cent and the anti-bacteria response from interior wall paint improved by 1700 per cent.

The timber coating market was estimated to be worth almost $US10 billion ($A13.4 billion) and the interior wall paint market was $US39.8 billion.

PPK and Deakin have previously made breakthroughs in lithium sulphur batteries which are now being developed by a spin-off company LiS Energy.