IT’S A WRAP! The Project: Innovation, Collaboration, Sustainability

Vision & DesignSustainable Games, Sustainable Fabric

The Process: Problem-Solving & PartnershipHow Rainier Got the JobGetting Down to WorkProducing the FabricMaking the PanelsInstalling the Wrap

Thanks to the Team

2012 LONDONOLYMPIC STADIUM WRAP

About DowDow combines the power of science and technology with the “Human Element” to passionately innovate what is essential to human progress. The Company connects chemistry and innovation with the principles of sustainability to help address many of the world's most challenging problems. Dow's diversified industry-leading portfolio of specialty chemical, advanced materials, agrosciences and plastics businesses delivers a broad range of technology-based products and solutions to customers in approximately 160 countries and in high growth sectors such as. In 2010, Dow had annual sales of $53.7 billion and employed approximately 50,000 people worldwide. The Company’s more than 5,000 products are manufactured at 188 sites in 35 countries across the globe. References to "Dow" or the "Company" mean The Dow Chemical Company and its consolidated subsidiaries unless otherwise expressly noted. More information about Dow can be found at www.dow.com.

THE PROJECT: Innovation, Collaboration, Sustainability

Worldwide Olympic Partner The Dow Chemical Company(NYSE:DOW) produced a sustainable fabric wrap to encircle London’s iconic Olympic Stadium during the Olympic and Paralympic Games. The stadium was home to several athletic events, and the Opening and Closing Ceremonies.

The wrap is comprised of 306 individual panels – each approximately 25 meters high and 2.5 meters wide – and helped make the stadium the visual centerpiece of the London 2012 Games.

Dow worked with Rainier Industries and Cooley Group to develop the wrap. These are the only companies in the world capable of producing the wrap within the specifications outlined.

In keeping with LOCOG’s goal to stage a sustainable Olympic Games, Rainier Industries, Dow and Cooley partnered to create a unique material developed specifically for this event.

The wrap includes resins made by Dow’s Performance Plastics Division and requires fewer raw materials to manufacture. It is up to 35 percent lighter and has a lower carbon footprint when compared to conventional materials.

Digital printing of the design was done at the Rainier Industries facility in Seattle, WA with UV-curable, water soluble inks instead of conventional solvent based inks, in order to reduce emissions during the printing process and eliminate volatile organic compounds (VOC).

The wrap includes post-industrial recycled content and the hardware used to hang the wrap will be recycled in Europe following the Games.

About Rainier IndustriesRainier is a state of the art international manufacturer of innovative sports graphics solutions and retail point of purchase displays, based in Seattle, Washington. The company’s work is visible in over a hundred professional and collegiate sports facilities, as well as major retail chains and the Salt Lake City and Vancouver Olympics. Rainier is certified to ISO 14001:2004 and ISO 9001:2008 as well as being a G7 certified Master Printer and receiving the SGIA Sustainability Recognition Award for 2011 for its Environmental Management System. More information about Rainier Industries can be found at www.rainierdisplays.com.

Partnership commits to improving Games experience through sustainable, chemistry-based solutions

We’re pleased to offer our congratulations to Populous, the architects behind the Olympic Stadium. The Olympic Stadium is shortlisted for the Stirling Prize, a prestigious architecture award, for its innovative design. The Stirling Prize winner will be announced on October 13, 2012.

Vision & Design

Olympic Stadium Shortlisted for 2012 Stirling Prize

The wrap completed the Olympic Stadium for the Games as the architects from Populous intended.

It also helped the stadium become the visual centerpiece of the London 2012 Games.

The wrap provided some protection to Olympic spectators from the sun and wind, and also featured directional signage and shielded exposed elements of the stadium from sight.

The Stirling Prize is the highest prize of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA). Read why the Stadium was chosen on the Stirling Prize website here.

“As with the other London 2012 Olympic Games buildings, Populous’s Olympic Stadium had to be designed to be used post-games. So the 80,000-seat stadium will shrink down to a 20,000-seat stadium after this summer.

In order to be able to achieve this, Populous designed the stadium as a sort of kit of parts, said principal Phillip Johnson in a video on RIBA’s site.

‘The roof itself is separate from the upper tier so that in theory you could take down the tier without taking down the roof, or vice-versa.’

The stadium will be the lightest one ever built, with 11,023 tons of steel.”

-Lindsay M. Roberts, Architect Magazine

Photo courtesy of The Guardian

Vision & DesignRainier’s design drawings for the Stadium Wrap

Vision: A virtual projection of the final wrap, complete with virtual spectators.

Reality: A quiet moment after the installation was finished –and before the spectators arrive.

Sustainable Games, Sustainable FabricThe Olympic Stadium wrap is “PVC-free.”

The processes used to make it are “eco-friendly.”

The London Organizing Committee of Olympic Games

(LOCOG) is committed to hosting “sustainable games.”

What does all of this mean?

For the Olympic committee, it means holding “Games guided by the principle that the world should live within its means.” They embraced several initiatives –related to venue, travel, food, and waste — to support this mission.

LOCOG says, “Where possible we have used existing venues…Where there is a legacy need we have built new venues – the Olympic Stadium, the Aquatics Centre and the Velodrome and where there is no need, we have built temporary venues in iconic places…”

Populous, the architects behind the stadium, designed the venue for this stated “legacy need.” During the Games, the Stadium seated 80,000 spectators. After the Olympics, the upper tier of the Stadium will be removed – the whole stadium is built to be deconstructable. The Stadium will transform into a smaller venue (seating 20,000) for regular use by the people of London.

Plus – it’s the lightest stadium ever built, according to Architect Magazine’s Aaron Seward: “The steel used in London’s Olympic Stadium was sourced in a sustainable manner. The subcontractor obtained many of the tubular members that make up the roof structure from unused steel sections intended for a Russian oil pipeline.

“When completed, the elliptical-shaped stadium covered a 40-acre footprint with just 10,000 metric tons (11,023 tons) of structural steel—by far the lightest Olympic Stadium ever built. In comparison, the 91,000-seat Beijing National Stadium (the Bird’s Nest) for the 2008 Summer Games covered a 64-acre footprint and used 100,000 metric tons (110,231 tons).”

London aimed to be the “first zero-waste games.”

99% of waste from the construction of the Olympic Park was reclaimed.

London 2012 Sustainability Summary Report,www.london2012.com

London aimed to be the “first zero-waste games.”

99% of waste from the construction of the Olympic Park was reclaimed.

London 2012 Sustainability Summary Report,www.london2012.com

“A pioneering walkway leading to the Olympic Park…lit round-the-clock by the footsteps of spectators.” –Earth911.com

photo credit: Pavegen Systems Ltd.

photo credit: iStock user Johnny Greig

LOCOG encouraged spectators to ride bikes, walk, & use public transportation to get to the Games.

photo credit: Rainier

For Dow, Rainier, and Cooley, this eco-conscious mission means using sustainable production (materials and processes) to make the Stadium wrap:

• The wrap includes resins made by Dow’s Performance Plastics Division and required fewer raw materials to manufacture.

• The wrap includes polyester fabric with a low-density Polyethylene coating.

• The wrap is up to 35 percent lighter and has a 20 percent lower carbon footprint when compared to conventional materials, according to Cooley Group.

• UV-curable inks replaced conventional inks to reduce emissions during the printing process and eliminated volatile organic compounds (VOC).

That last part—the UV-curable inks—is daily practice here at Rainier. We only use UV cured water soluble inks in our printers.

Sustainability in manufacturing means considering “lifecycle” – where materials come from, how they are used… and where will they go. The Wrap will be repurposed.

Dow has partnered with leading UK building and development charity Article 25 and recycling company Axion Recycling to reuse the Wrap. The panels are slated for shelter and shade solutions for at-risk children in Rio and Uganda. In Brazil, Dow and Article 25 are exploring working with the Bola Pra Frente Institute, which helps children and teenagers from underprivileged communities through social programs. In Uganda, the wrap will be used as part of Article 25’s work with Jubilee Action at a center for former child soldiers.

The panels will remain as much in their current shape as possible, keeping the look of the Games that has inspired athletes and spectators around the world.

Axion Recycling will reuse or recycle portions of the wrap for additional projects in the UK. The hardware used to hang the wrap will be recycled in Europe.

We’re grateful that LOCOG made sustainability a focus of the Games this year, and we hope it’ll become expected practice for future Olympics.

More about Rainier’s Sustainability Initiative and daily practices is available on our website.

Sustainable Games, Sustainable Fabric

THE PROCESS: Problem-Solving & Partnership

How Rainier Got the Job

photo credit above: thestarphoenix.com

In February 2011, Dow began to consider putting in an open tender to wrap the stadium as part of their Olympic sponsorship. A mutual friend (who had worked with us for the 2002 Salt Lake City Games) suggested Dow consult with Bruce Dickinson, our VP of Sales.

We have experience with Olympic venues (we did projects in Salt Lake City and Vancouver) and we regularly do work on sports stadiums across the USA – and we’ve worked with fabric since our start in 1896.

Dow’s initial conversation with Rainier was about the feasibility of such a big project – with such special constraints.

What would it take to wrap a stadium of this size? Could it be done using polyethylene materials, so that the process and materials would be sustainable? Could the results be repurposed?

Rainier said yes, it can be done. We suggested Dow go to Cooley Group to find a fabric that would work. That was the team: Dow, Rainier, and Cooley. Three companies highly invested in sustainable materials and processes. Dow, whose team is all over the world. Cooley, in Rhode Island and South Carolina. Rainier, based in Seattle, WA.

Dow submitted their bid in April 2011, and by May, Rainier had a contract to print, cut, and sew the panels for the wrap. Cooley would engineer and produce the fabric.

And then the question was –

How do we take what’s essentially a very cool picture and make it into reality in less than a year?

Getting Down to WorkDow is an international leader in Elastomers. Rainier is an international manufacturer of innovative fabric and display products. Cooley Group is an industry leader of engineered fabrics, focused on using sustainable chemistry.

All three companies provide solutions. And it’s a good thing, because wrapping the Olympic Stadium was one big exercise in problem-solving.

The panels had to be strong, flexible, beautiful – they were an integral part of the architects’ vision for the stadium. They weren’t an “add-on” or a “decoration.”

They were an architectural element, a crucial part of the aesthetic and functional design.

What Rainier, Dow, and Cooley quickly found after starting to work together was that the existing fabric we’d planned to use wouldn’t work –it meets the USA fire standards, but not the British Standards. That eliminated the initial material – then several others.

A very over-simplified explanation of fabric: pellets are pushed through an extruder, resulting in material that’s thin, wide, and flexible. Extruders like fabric that’s roughly 90% liquid and 10% solid. But in order to meet the British Standards, the fabric had to be about 10% liquid and 90% solid. That’s approximately the make-up of roofing membranes.

Our first challenge and the hardest one we faced: to take technology used for horizontal surfaces (roofs) and apply it to vertical textiles (banners rising in helixes over 80 feet high, from the ground concourse to the upper tier of the stadium, supported by tensioning cables).

It was like pushing mud through the extruder. The material was too stiff, it didn’t spread, it wouldn’t print. Rainier doesn’t engineer the chemical composition of fabric – we make things with fabric – so we listened in while Dow and Cooley tackled the hard science.

They went back to the design board –and created an entirely new formulation of infrastructure membranes.

Producing the Fabric

A look at the process:

To make fabric, you have to run a minimum of 1,000 yards.

The process takes 8 hours - if there are no problems. And you don’t know anything about the quality of the material until you’re done.

Plus, the fabric passes through the extruder three times, multiplying the potential for failure:

o Pass 1. Apply the black-out layer.o Pass 2. 1st coating of white.o Pass 3. Flip it, 2nd coating of white.

Cooley Group produced the fabric for the Olympic Stadium Wrap.

When a sample of new material would arrive at the Rainier facilities, we’d test it on our printers. We lost 3 printer heads in the process, and several valuable months.

When we thought we were close,Rainier’s Display Division Manager Charlie Rueb flew down to Cooley’s plant in South Carolina.

As the fabric rolled off the extruder, Charlie deemed it fit to try – again – on our printers.

This is what the raw material of polyethylene looks like before it’s melted & run through the extruder –it comes in pellets.

Producing the Fabric

3. Once we got a smooth sheet, we put the material through the extruder for pass #1 – applying the black-out layer. As you can see in this picture, the black is shredding off the scrim.

1. Raw material coming through the extruder. As you can see, it’s not coming through smoothly, as one sheet.

2. A different try – better, but not good enough.

4. We re-formulate the pellets & try again. It appears to work…

5. …but during pass #2, the material goes in front of the light-box & it’s clear the black has not evenly applied. Try again.

6. This time we get all the way to pass #2 – the black-out has been applied, the extruder is layering white on, and now we can see holes in the white. (Those aren’t black dots – they’re holes showing the black layer beneath.)

Fabric is extremely heat sensitive. Because this is so thick, the heat from the extruder isn’t applying evenly, and the white can’t spread properly across the entire surface.

Producing the Fabric

8. Finally! A smooth white stretch of fabric.

7. We get a full, clean sheet of fabric through all 3 passes of the extruder (black-out, white, & white again). But the fabric puckers & bunches in the middle. Back to the beginning.

How the Olympic Wrap panels were made in 9 steps

Keep in mind that this was an unusual project, with unusual requirements – and an untested, unproven fabric.

This is the process of Rainier making the Olympic Stadium panels, including retries and final successes.

And it is representative of Rainier. Because everything we make here is custom, this is operations as usual – in that nothing is usual!

We call ourselves solution providers, because we solve problems.

We run the fabric through our printer to see how it does with color.

STEP ONE: Color tests and print trials

Making the Panels

STEP TWO: Testing a mock-up panel

We print a panel, cut it, and hang it. The fabric doesn’t work. See all that texture across the red (right)? The fabric is puckering. Because the fabric is puckering, we have to raise the printer head. As a result, we end up with another problem: banding, those vertical streaks of lighter and darker ink. The gap between the head and the media is too large – so the ink is too spread out.

We redesign the fabric (which means going back through that entire fabric production process) and try again. Until it works.

At this time, we have 6 months to test it, print it, cut it, sew it, pack it, ship it, and install it.

Making the Panels

Once we have new fabric, we mock up a new panel. Look at that smooth expanse of blue. That’s what we are after, and now that we have it, production can begin in earnest.

When we finally get the fabric right… rolls of it arrive on the Rainier production floor.

Making the Panels

Working with this new fabric was like working with cardboard.

Every single step of the process –from printing to installation – presented new challenges.

The Rainier team came up with new solutions and solved each problem as it arose.

STEP THREE: Printing the panels

Making the Panels

STEP FOUR: Cutting the panels

Rainier owner Scott Campbell takes a turn at cutting the panels while VP of Sales Bruce Dickinson gives him a (rather far-off) helping hand.

Making the Panels

Rainier uses state-of-the-art automated cutting machines. As with every other step of this project, cutting the fabric presented unique challenges.

Because of its stiff, thick composition, we cut all 306 panels by hand– extremely unusual on our shop floor.

We get the job done, no matter what it takes.

Every panel has “pockets” running their lengths – like seams on garments. The pockets hold the cables that eventually twist to create the helixes.

Employees work their way along the length of the panel to sew the second layer of the pockets. Every pocket is given double layers of fabric to protect against abrasion from the cable.

STEP FIVE: Sewing the pockets

Remember, every panel is over 80 feet long!

Making the Panels

STEP SIX: Laying out the panels for finishing touches

What look like white dots at the bottom of the panel are essentially punched holes. In the installation, the panels are bolted to a clamp bar at the bottom and top.

The rope you see here is a drawstring, used to pull the cable up the length of the pocket.

Making the Panels

In this picture, you can see the before (left) –white rolls of fabric – and the after (right) –bolts of finished panels packed away in individual cubbyholes.

STEP SEVEN: Packing the panels

Because of the fabric stiffness and the thickness of the double-layer pockets, the fabric is folded and wrapped around bolts, rather than “rolled.”

We build special shipping crates to house the fabric bolts.Making the Panels

STEP NINE: The Rainier team celebrates and waves good-bye as the wrap leaves Seattle, WA, bound for London

STEP EIGHT: Loading & shipping

Making the Panels

To install the panels, Rainier partnered with FabriTec, a division of ShadeUSA based in Dallas, Texas.

The original plan allowed three months for installation, starting in December 2011 – but that was before all the challenges making the fabric.

In the first week of April 2012, FabriTec did their test install of a set of panels.

The results were not good – it took 5 days to do 3 panels. At that rate, it was a 2 year installation job to put up 306 panels.

Changes were made to the templates to allow for faster installation – and install methods were re-engineered to meet the condensed timeframe.

Installation of all 306 panels began on June 11, 2012.

It was finished July 20 – the last day any work was allowed on the stadium.

That’s right – FabriTec installed all 306 panels, each 80 feet long, in just over a month. Instead of 12 weeks, they did the installation in 5.

Installing the Wrap

Installing the Wrap

Installing the Wrap

We had 6 teams of 6 people for installation.

Their goal was to get 2 panels up per day.

The teams doubled that rate and hit an impressive rate of 4 per day.

Installing the Wrap

Installing the Wrap

Installing the Wrap

BEFORE AFTER

The most unusual aspect of this project was also the most crucial to its success –the partnership between Dow, Rainier, and Cooley.

This was a giant undertaking. From conception to finish, everything about the Olympic Stadium Wrap required innovation, dedication, and determination. The teams at all 3 companies had to problem-solve at every step of the process. The unique material of the wrap, the short timeline, & the high-profile nature of the project made this a high-pressure situation.

Throughout the process, Dow had an unusual role. Traditionally, we suppose you could say they were the “customer” – they wanted a wrap for the Olympic Stadium made, and they asked Rainier and Cooley to make it for them. In reality, Dow was so much more that.

They were a partner. They offered their own resources and expertise whenever possible. Dow leadership and scientists provided support, encouragement, & camaraderie at every turn.

Besides the hundreds of conference calls and emails, there were visits: Dow came to Seattle to see Rainier. Rainier and Dow met Cooley at their plant in South Carolina. And Rainier went to London – 4 separate times!

We count ourselves lucky to have had such great partners. The Wrap couldn’t have been made any other way. Each of the 3 companies contributed distinctive skill sets & capabilities – and each brought exceptional personalities to the table.

Render from the Populous 2012 Stadium website

“What’s most remarkable about this project is how these three very different companies worked together – in this

compressed timeline –to get this done. Everyone rallied

together.”

–Charlie Rueb, Rainier Display Division Manager

Thanks, Dow & Cooley: it’s been great working with you. We’re so proud of what we’ve done, and also how we got it done – together.

THANKS TO THE TEAM