C arlos Soares has sold enough flooring to furnish all the residences, businesses and public facilities in a medium-sized city since starting Divine Flooring in 1999. But now the Calgary entrepreneur will expand into manufacturing luxury flooring using a key Alberta hydrocarbon that will create a more sustainable product and reduce reliance on imports. “People walk on luxury vinyl floors every day in their homes, malls, stores, hotels— it is the fastest growing category in our industry over the past decade,” says Soares, whose business employs 165 people and 250 contractors in Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, and Chicago. “Billions of square feet of new floor coverings are manufactured and installed every year around the world.” While luxury vinyl products mimic the look of natural woods, they generally contain polyvinyl chlorides or PVCs, a synthetic plastic polymer used to create flexibility and durability. PVCs are difficult to recycle and take a lot of energy to produce. Most PVC production is in Asia, with roughly half of the world’s capacity in China. Soares has discovered a more environmentally friendly alternative to PVCs produced at the Heartland Polymers plant near Edmonton. Opened by Inter Pipeline Ltd. in July 2022, the facility produces polypropylene plastic pellets directly from locally sourced propane, a first of its kind in North America. Polypropylene is one of the world’s most widely used recyclable plastics.
By converting about 22,000 barrels per day of propane into polypropylene instead of using it as fuel, Heartland says it cuts up to one million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions annually — the equivalent of about 217,000 cars. “Polypropylene is our secret sauce. It can do all the things PVCs do,” says Soares. “But it is made in Alberta, and it is a low- emission product free of chemicals that make it tough to recycle.” Soares and his partners in a venture called PolyCo have started construction on a $45 million facility in Balzac, about 25 kilometres north of downtown Calgary, to manufacture luxury vinyl flooring using Heartland polypropylene. A second-generation Canadian and entrepreneur, he wants to give back to the place where he grew up in a meaningful way. “My grandparents moved to Canada from Portugal in 1967 and this country has given our family so much. My father started his own welding shop in 1974 and ran it for years with old-school values. He always taught me to do the right thing and don’t compromise on quality,” he says. “That’s what we want to do with this proposal. We are putting more Canadians to work to make a more sustainable product and strengthen our local economy.” Image #3 - Insert Comment & Photo Credit included below the image in a smaller font: Carlos Soares, President of Divine Flooring. Photo for the Canadian Energy Centre Production at the plant is scheduled to start
The Heartland Polymers project in Fort Saskatchewan, Alta.
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People walk on luxury vinyl floors every day in their homes, malls, stores, hotels— it is the fastest growing
BUSINESS • SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE 81 category in our industry over the past decade ”
Carlos Soares, President of Divine Flooring.
80 SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE • VOL 25 ISSUE 4
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