I tell everyone I know outside the finishing and coating industry that the owners and operators of shops are among the most environmentally conscious people I have ever met.
That is, of course, after they ask me about hexavalent chromium, Erin Brockovich, and sometimes even Three Mile Island.
But I tell them squarely: There has never been an electroplater, anodizer, or powder coater that I have ever met or stepped foot in their facility who didn't give me the sense that they truly cared about the environment and the health and safety of their employees.
And it is not just because the electroplating and finishing industry appears to be the second-most regulated in the U.S., after the nuclear sector.
Yes, of course, the owners of finishing and coating shops have a financial stake in making sure they do not pollute around their facility, or do anything that might make their employees and surrounding neighbors ill.
And yes, they go to work every day knowing they must abide by the rules and regulations governing their shops, lest local environmental agencies or even the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency come knocking at their door.
The finishing and coating industry has truly cleaned itself up from the days of the 1960s, 1970s, and even 1980s, when a handful of shops would cheat the system — or they just didn't give a damn about anything except the almighty buck — and gave the industry a bad name as a major polluter.
All that changed when the industry began cleaning up and realized it was in its best interest to become more environmentally friendly.
And then we have the case of Tribar Technologies in Wixom, Michigan, which suffered one of the largest environmental incidents in the finishing and coating industry in 2024, when a rogue employee sabotaged the wastewater treatment system at a large automotive electroplater. The employee repeatedly went into work — alone — and opened the valves on a 10,000+ holding tank of untreated wastewater containing about 5% hex chrome. He also reportedly kept overriding the bells and whistles of the alarm system meant to alert facility staff of such an incident.
It was a nightmare situation for everyone involved: the community that saw its waterways contaminated, the agencies that had to help clean up the mess, the Tribar business entity that suffered this, and the Tribar employees who eventually lost their jobs.
We tell the story of what happened and how it all transpired in an article in the November issue. We pored over hundreds of documents and reports from local and state agencies that responded, and we had to piece together how this series of events unfolded. It was eye-opening — to say the least — about how an agency investigates these types of incidents, especially when the business and some of the individual actors lawyer up and don't want to incriminate themselves.
While we mentioned above that it was sad this happened to Tribar due to a rogue employee, it's worth noting that the company was cited many times before — and even afterwards — for failing to follow environmental guidelines. They are not innocent here and eventually pleaded guilty in the U.S. District Court to charges. Tribar could have run a tighter ship and been more proactive in following the rules. Instead, they did some things along the way that may have given rise to the idea of what this rogue employee did. We'll never know.
What we do know is that the industry suffered a black eye. Perhaps the lesson is that more shops will be even more diligent, or at least we hope.
Tim Pennington is Editor-in-Chief of Finishing and Coating, and has covered the industry since 2010. He has traveled extensively throughout North America visiting shops and production facilities, and meeting those who work in the industry. Tim began his career in the newspaper industry, then wound itself between the sports field with the PGA Tour and marketing and communications firms, and finally back into the publishing world in the finishing and coating sector. If you want to reach Tim, just go 
