Our commercial lead Liz Manning won the Dr. Herman Stone Technical Excellence Award at the Polyurethane Foam Association 2023 spring meeting. Her presentation, “Redeeming Carbon: CO2-Based Polyols for Polyurethane Applications,” was voted best by those attending the Technical Program. Liz’s presentation detailed Econic’s catalyst technology that allows captured waste CO2 to be used as a raw material for a range of polyols, replacing up to 50% of traditional oil-based feedstocks.
The award is named for Dr. Herman T. Stone, a legendary figure in the flexible polyurethane foam industry who passed away earlier this year at the age of 98. He served as PFA’s first Technical Director. Dr. Stone left his mark on almost every aspect of the FPF industry, from lab research, process development, applications research and technological forecasting through regulatory compliance, patents and trademarks, and waste minimization and disposal. He pioneered much of the FPF industry’s flammability research and was a leader and an officer in the PFA and in other industry and national associations. In 2007, Dr. Stone was inducted into the Flexible Polyurethane Foam Hall of Fame.
Beyond his professional work, Dr. Stone spent much time educating young people on the importance of remembering the Holocaust. His own personal story appears in the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC.
“Dr. Stone would have been particularly proud of the quality of the technical presentations this Spring,” noted Bill Gollnitz, Past President of PFA and Moderator for the Technical Program. “In the voting for the Technical Excellence Award (the winner is chosen by the audience in the Technical Session), every presentation received first place votes, and all finished within fractions of a point of each other.”
