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At PPG’s Coatings Innovation Center in Allison Park, Pennsylvania, researchers were developing coatings that could do more than protect or decorate a vehicle. During a 2018 visit, the company described a way to make a dark car look black to people while helping LIDAR detect it, alongside work on clearer camera lenses and coatings for electric-vehicle batteries. These were development efforts reported at the time—not proof of a production-ready product.
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Why dark paint can challenge vehicle sensors
Visible color and sensor visibility are not always the same thing. As PPG senior scientist Calum Munro explained to GeekWire in its February 22, 2018 report, dark paint can absorb more of the light signal a LIDAR system uses. That can make a dark vehicle harder for the sensor to detect than a lighter one.
PPG’s proposed answer was a coating system that allowed the sensor signal to pass through the dark-looking surface, reach a reflective underlayer and return toward the sensor. Munro summarized the intended effect this way: “What we’ve been able to do is make black look black and beautiful to our eyes, but when a sensor looks at it, it might as well be white.”
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PPG’s January 15, 2018 announcement also identified coatings for dark-color vehicle detection and applications involving LIDAR and radar visibility. The public descriptions establish the concept and intended applications; they do not give comparative performance figures or show that the coating was deployed in production vehicles.
What PPG was developing beyond the exterior finish
Coatings for autonomous-car camera lenses
The 2018 GeekWire account said PPG was working on coatings for cameras used in autonomous vehicles, with the aim of helping keep lenses clear when exposed to dirt and insects. The account describes a development goal, not independently verified cleaning performance or a finished commercial product.
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Coatings for EV and hybrid battery packs
PPG also described coatings for electric- and hybrid-vehicle battery systems. The company’s stated aims included reducing weight and improving safety and vehicle range. Those are intended benefits, not measured outcomes established by the cited reporting.
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In its January 2018 auto-show announcement, PPG discussed IOCRON cathode binder, a battery coating-process product designed to eliminate N-methylpyrrolidone from the standard cathode coating process while maintaining battery performance. This is adjacent battery-process work; it is distinct from the dark-paint sensor coating.
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- NO DRIPS OR FLING - Achieve a deep wet look with our premium silicone-based blend. Quick and easy to apply, it won’t drip or fling on your vehicle, unlike messy water-based or oil-based competitors.
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Inside the Allison Park research center
GeekWire described the Coatings Innovation Center as part of an 86-acre Allison Park complex north of Pittsburgh, with research and development for coatings used across products ranging from electronics to aircraft. The article reported a workforce of 380 researchers at the time. Both figures describe the facility as reported in 2018, not verified current specifications.
The center’s work also sits within a business-to-business coatings industry rather than a consumer paint aisle. PPG’s current automotive coatings page describes services for automakers and automotive suppliers and lists autonomous- and electric-vehicle coatings among its segments. That market positioning does not establish that the particular sensor coating described in 2018 is currently sold or available to consumers.
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- ULTIMATE PROTECTION - Provides superior UV defense and shields your surfaces from harsh weather. This powerful formula ensures long-lasting protection, keeping surfaces vibrant and new.
- NO DRIPS OR FLING - Achieve a deep wet look with our premium silicone-based blend. Quick and easy to apply, it won’t drip or fling on your vehicle, unlike messy water-based or oil-based competitors.
- REDUCES ADHESION - Fills microscopic pores creating a barrier that prevents mud and dirt from bonding to your vehicle's surfaces, making future clean-ups quicker and easier.
How PPG connected the work to vehicle testing
On January 16, 2018, PPG announced a research partnership with the University of Michigan’s Mcity. The company said the relationship would draw on testing and research assets, project data, university expertise, and a forum involving suppliers, manufacturers and end users. The announcement documents the partnership’s stated scope at that time; it does not establish that the relationship continues today.
Mcity director Huei Peng said in the announcement that safe, thorough testing was essential to proving the viability of advanced mobility technologies. The partnership provides context for how companies and researchers could investigate autonomous-vehicle technologies, but it is not evidence that the featured coating passed a particular test.
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What the public record does—and does not—show
A later Chemical & Engineering News report published December 8, 2025, described the Allison Park R&D site as built in 1974 and said most projects there are subject to customer nondisclosure agreements. That later account helps explain why a public tour may reveal only part of the work. It does not establish what happened commercially to the autonomous-vehicle coatings described in 2018.
- Established: PPG publicly described a dark-vehicle coating concept intended to let LIDAR signals return from a reflective layer while preserving a dark visible appearance.
- Also reported: PPG was developing camera-lens coatings and battery-related coatings or materials for automotive applications.
- Not established by these sources: independent performance results, production deployment, present availability of the specific sensor coating, or a consumer retail version.
PPG’s Munro described the broader shift in coatings as adding “this third leg of the stool that’s coming into play, which is functionality.” In the self-driving-car example, that meant treating a coating not only as a finish or protective layer, but as part of the vehicle’s interaction with its sensors.
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