What happened to NACE and SSPC?
NACE International and SSPC (The Society for Protective Coatings) merged in January 2021 to form AMPP — the Association for Materials Protection and Performance. The organizations no longer exist separately, but the standards they published remain in force, and the industry still specifies work using their legacy designations. That gap — one association, two families of old names — is where specification errors are born.
This article maps the designations you will actually meet in specifications, purchase orders and inspection reports, and shows how to cite them so that every bidder prices the same thing.
Why the old names refuse to die
Three reasons keep NACE and SSPC designations alive years after the merger:
- Long-lived specifications. A pipeline or tank specification written in 2015 cites "SSPC-SP 10 / NACE No. 2". That document may govern maintenance work for decades, and nobody will rewrite it just to modernize an acronym.
- Joint standards were already dual-branded. The most-used surface preparation standards were published jointly by both organizations, so each one carries two legacy names — and now lives under a third banner.
- Contracts reference editions, not associations. A contract that invokes a specific edition of a standard remains valid regardless of what the publishing body is called today.
The practical consequence: you must be able to read all three generations of names, and your own specifications should make the equivalence explicit.
The designation map
The table below covers the joint surface-preparation standards most often cited in industrial coating work. The legacy designations remain the ones you will see in the field; AMPP continues to publish and maintain these standards.
| Common name | SSPC designation | NACE designation | What it requires |
|---|---|---|---|
| Solvent cleaning | SSPC-SP 1 | — | Removal of oil, grease and soluble contaminants before any blast work |
| Hand tool cleaning | SSPC-SP 2 | — | Removal of loose rust, mill scale and paint by hand tools |
| Power tool cleaning | SSPC-SP 3 | — | Same as SP 2, with power tools |
| White metal blast | SSPC-SP 5 | NACE No. 1 | Blast to a surface free of all visible rust, scale and coating |
| Commercial blast | SSPC-SP 6 | NACE No. 3 | Blast with staining permitted on a limited portion of the surface |
| Brush-off blast | SSPC-SP 7 | NACE No. 4 | Light blast removing loose material only |
| Near-white metal blast | SSPC-SP 10 | NACE No. 2 | Blast with only slight staining permitted — the workhorse of immersion and pipeline service |
| Power tool to bare metal | SSPC-SP 11 | — | Power tools to bare metal with a surface profile |
| Waterjetting | SSPC-SP WJ-1 to WJ-4 | NACE WJ-1 to WJ-4 | Four cleanliness grades achieved with high- and ultrahigh-pressure water |
Two reading rules save most disputes:
- A NACE number and its paired SSPC designation describe the same requirement. "NACE No. 2" and "SSPC-SP 10" in two different documents are not two different preparations.
- The absence of a NACE pair does not make a standard obsolete. SP 1, SP 2, SP 3 and SP 11 were SSPC-only publications and remain fully citable.
For what each cleanliness grade looks like in practice — and how to verify it on the wall — see our surface preparation guide.
Certifications: what CIP became
The certification programs followed the associations into the merger. The Coating Inspector Program (CIP), historically run by NACE, continues under AMPP, and inspectors certified under the legacy program remain recognized. When a specification calls for "a NACE-certified inspector", the current equivalent is an inspector certified under the corresponding AMPP program — a wording update worth making explicitly in new documents rather than leaving bidders to interpret.
How to cite standards in a specification today
A specification written this year should not force the reader to do the mapping in their head. Our recommended pattern:
| Situation | Recommended wording |
|---|---|
| New specification | Cite the current AMPP-maintained designation, followed by the legacy pair in parentheses — e.g. "SSPC-SP 10/NACE No. 2 (near-white metal blast)" |
| Amending an old specification | Keep the cited edition, add an equivalence note identifying the current publisher |
| Inspection reports | Report against the designation cited in the governing specification, never a "translated" one |
| Inspector qualification | Name the AMPP program and level, with "or legacy NACE/SSPC equivalent" |
The goal is always the same: one requirement, one unambiguous name, every bidder pricing identical work.
FAQ
Are NACE standards still valid after the merger? Yes. The standards remain in force and continue to be maintained under AMPP. The merger changed the publisher, not the technical requirements.
Is AMPP renaming all the old standards? AMPP maintains the legacy catalogue and publishes new standards under its own designation system. In practice, the joint surface-preparation standards are still cited by their SSPC/NACE names, and your specifications can continue to do so.
What is the difference between NACE No. 2 and SSPC-SP 10? None. They are the same joint standard carrying both organizations' designations. A dispute between the two names is a dispute about nothing.
Does a "NACE-certified" inspector requirement still make sense in a new contract? It will be understood, but it is imprecise. Name the AMPP certification program and level explicitly, and accept legacy equivalents.
Do Canadian standards use these designations? Canadian coating specifications commonly reference the SSPC/NACE surface preparation grades — including qualification testing under standards such as CSA Z245.30 for field-applied pipeline coatings — alongside ISO 8501 visual grades. A well-written specification states which system governs.
Working to these standards in Canada
Induscoat Canada prepares and coats industrial equipment to the surface preparation and coating standards your specification invokes — legacy or current — with the documentation trail your inspector expects. If a specification's designations are ambiguous, we flag it before pricing, not after mobilization. Tell us about your project through our corrosion protection services or request a quote — we respond within 24 business hours.
Hicham M, P Eng, PMP
Engineer and project manager (PMP) at Induscoat Canada. Over 16 years of experience in industrial coatings, composite repairs and wear protection on mining, energy and petrochemical sites in Canada and internationally.