Albemarle researcher Kumar G. Kumar recently presented at the 21^st Annual Conference on Recent Advances on Flame Retardancy of Polymeric Materials on the innovative GreenArmor™ fire retardant introduced by Earthwise™. He outlined the three main ways GreenArmor differs from other
currently used fire retardants.

A new generation of High Performance Polymeric flame-retardants has been developed at Albemarle Corporation. Designed for use in a broad range of plastics, these products are made via a break-through technology. The flexibility of this technology allows the products to be tailored to offer a unique set of physical and flame retardant properties in a “single-package” solution. Thanks to their non-bio accumulative, non-toxic nature, and excellent recyclability, these products are ideal for a polymer industry striving for more environmentally friendly and sustainable fire safety solutions.

Brominated compounds continue to be the most efficient and cost effective classes of flame retardants. While they are very effective in imparting flame retardancy, often times some of these FR’s fall short on meeting other requirements in terms of the physical and mechanical properties of the polymers to which they are added. There is also a growing need for effective flame retardant solutions that are more environmentally friendly, sustainable and recyclable. Polymeric flame retardants are especially gaining more interest due to their larger molecular structure. Polymeric materials that have a molecular wt greater than 1000 are not expected to bio-accumulate or possess toxicity. Researchers at Albemarle have developed a new technology to make stable low molecular weight brominated polymers (OECD definition) using readily available raw materials. These polymers were found to have a wide range of properties that can be tailored to offer specific physical and flame retardant performance in any given resin system. GreenArmor is the first of this new generation polymers and has high bromine content, better FR efficiency, is melt-blendable and can be used in both thermoplastic and thermoset polymers. Polymers flame retarded with GreenArmor have excellent mechanical and electrical properties, offer better thermal and color stability and have excellent recyclability. This presentation summarizes the performances of GreenArmor in a number of different polymer systems. Read more by downloading the study and the PowerPoint presentation.

About the author
Dr. Kumar G. Kumar, Albemarle Corporation, Senior Research and Development Advisor

With over twenty-one years with Albemarle Corporation, Dr. Kumar Kumar serves as a Senior Research and Development Advisor. He has been working with flame retardant for the past 15 years. He began his work as a synthesis chemist and later changed his focus to customer application and technical services. Dr. Kumar manages the Flame Retardant Thermoplastics application lab and technical service for many flame retardant products for the US and the Asia Pacific. Dr. Kumar also serves as the Research and Development Segment leader for Electronic Enclosures at Albemarle.  Dr. Kumar has a number of publications and patents in the Flame Retardant area. Dr. Kumar received his PhD in Organic Chemistry from University of Madras, India.