Gypsum industry news

US: Xeriant has partnered with a ‘leading US-based compounding facility’ for lab-scale production and testing of its Nexboard alternative wallboard. Dow Jones Institutional News has reported that the collaboration will centre on modification of Nexboard’s intumescent system. The aim is to increase its fire resistance in line with the NFPA 286 fire test-based safety standard for interior wall and ceiling finishes.

Xeriant CEO Keith Duffy said "This collaboration leverages decades of experience in processing and testing plastic composite formulations. Their vast knowledge base, combined with the ability to produce and test small samples, allows us to compress the product development life cycle, lowering costs and shortening the timeline to full-scale production."

US: Xeriant will begin to produce its Nexboard alternative wallboard for sale at some time in the near-term future after making further recipe adjustments focused on ensuring fire safety. The company has contracted large-scale production to a ‘well-established’ producer, with which it is currently in the setup stage. It is also in talks with a bank about finance.

CEO Keith Duffy said "After initial fire testing at a national certification laboratory in June 2024, we engaged a polymer chemist to refine Nexboard's composition with a focus on passing the rigorous NFPA 286 fire safety test. This step followed several modifications in the base material and fire-retardant compositions and the finalisation of a production method that ensures the highest-volume, best quality and lowest-cost output. This extensive research and testing over many months has led us to believe that the additional changes will enable Nexboard to meet or even surpass the existing code requirements for building materials used in our targeted applications."

Ukraine: The Russian military has reportedly damaged Knauf’s Donbass gypsum wallboard plant in an airstrike. Ukrainian Donetsk regional military administration chief Pavlo Kyrylenko posted on social media on 17 May 2022 that firefighters were working to contain and quell the blaze at the plant in Donetsk Region. Nobody was injured in the attack.

Knauf sent home the Knauf Gips Donbass plant’s 589 employees ‘as a precaution’ at the outbreak of war on 24 February 2022.

Knauf maintains 14 facilities with a total of 3900 employees in Russia.

US: Underwriters Laboratories (UL) has completed fire performance evaluation on some of USG’s Sheetrock Brand EcoSmart Panel products. The testing concluded that 15.9mm USG Sheetrock Brand EcoSmart Panels Firecode X (UL Type ULIX) and USG Sheetrock Brand EcoSmart Panels Mold Tough Firecode X (UL Type ULIX) is specified in more than 260 fire-rated wall, column, and floor- and roof-ceiling UL designs in which Type X or Type C panels are required.

“Quickly and accurately identifying gypsum panel types in the field – especially after the panels have been hung and the joints are finished – can be challenging. Consequently, fire performance may be compromised if Type X panels are inadvertently hung as the ceiling membrane, whether in steel or wood construction, when Type C panels are required,” said Nestor Sanchez, senior manager, building science at USG.

US: The Oxford Fire Department responded to a minor fire on 22 September 2015 at the National Gypsum Company in Oxford, Michigan.

A call first came in about a fire in the plant's paper bale room around 11:15am from an employee at the plant, according to Oxford fire chief Gary Sparks. Firefighters were on scene within three minutes of the call, extinguished the fire and left the scene by 12:40, said Sparks.

It is unclear how the fire started, but the sprinkler system held the flames in check until responders arrived on the scene. "There was minimal damage," said Sparks. "The majority of it was to the paper bales, but there was some smoke damage in the office area." There were no injuries reported during the incident and the plant was expected to be up and running before the day ended.