Chevrolet is seemingly seeking to implement more and more environmentally-friendly technologies inside its factories. The latest innovation is one that will reduce the carbon footprint associated with… painting the cars!
The technique employed by General Motors will be applied to the new 2012 Chevy Sonic, and will consist in the fact that the car will only need to go through the baking oven only once. This is possible because of the new painting technique allows for three paint layers to be overlaid one above the other while the previous layer is still wet.
The new painting technique will reduce the overall greenhouse emissions by 10 percent (which translates into 80,000 metric tons per year) and a measly 40 bucks off the car’s price.
“Cutting our greenhouse gas emissions and reducing our energy consumption were key to implementing our water-based ‘three-wet’ paint process,” Orion’s plant manager Mauricio Pincheira said. “We want to provide a durable paint that impresses our first-time Sonic customers and maintain the tough environmental standards we have across the company.”
If their plan will be fruitful, GM will probably expand the painting technique to all of the models produced from 2012 onwards. For now, they haven’t said a word on possible expansion schemes.
