Laundry is becoming a more sustainable practice, thanks to a variety of innovations in the process and associated products. Detergents are playing their part in reducing the environmental impact of each and every laundry cycle. New formulations, coupled with dedicated campaigns to encourage less impactful practices, are helping make environmentally conscious washing norms. However, green initiatives are something the industry struggles with because these often cost more money.
With certification systems raising awareness, and consumers being encouraged to seriously consider the impact of each wash, technology and innovations will likely dominate the market in the years to come.
Research and developments are guided by the challenges one faces in a given scenario and later to achieve better sustainable practices. Before getting into the latest trends in fabric cleaning, it is therefore necessary to know the four interdependent factors that define the cleaning performance.
- Chemical action (chemical energy):This represents the action of the dissolved detergent. The action is increased or decreased by the concentration of the detergent ingredients in the solution (water + product).
- Mechanical action (mechanical energy):This is the mechanical action of the washing machine, which generates friction and pressure. For manual washing,when no equipment or devices are used, the person doing the cleaning is considered to provide mechanical action by rubbing, sometimes with the help of auxiliary devices (e.g. scrubbing board).
- Temperature effect (thermal energy):Heat is often used in cleaning activities. The elevated temperature enhances the chemical reactions, solubilises greasy soils and weakens the binding forces of the soil on the fabric.
- Time:The duration of the cleaning operations determines how long the product is allowed to act. Combined with the mechanical, thermal and chemical action, the duration affects the cleaning power. Longer cleaning times will typically improve the cleaning performance.
Innovators have worked on the above four factors individually or in combination to develop a technology that could help in reducing the chemical, water & energy and thus contributing to greater savings and greener environment.
Innovative Trends and technologies for fabric Cleaning
- Low temperature detergent formulations
- Polymer bead technology
- Ozone technology
- Ultra-sonic technology
Low Temperature Detergent Formulation
There is a transition to lower temperature washing that has been enabled by recent product innovations. Small changes in wash temperatures are able to generate significant savings in energy consumption. By way of indication, a 3°C reduction in washing temperature among the five countries involved in the campaign would deliver an annual energy saving 1,307.9GWh – the equivalent of the electricity consumed by a city of 180,000 inhabitants in a year.
Below is the comparative done between traditional fabric washing & low temperature.
The low temperature detergent formulations have brought about considerable saving in water, energy, increased linen life & reduced effluent load with efficient soil removal.
Polymer Bead Technology
A new innovation based on the hydrophilic properties of polymer beads delivers a trio of benefits:
- better cleaning
- lower cost
- a green solution
This technology which uses tiny polymer beads to get linens and towels clean by using much less water and detergent in the process. This not only delivers superior cleaning power, but also saves money and helps achieve greener environment.
A hydrophilic molecule or portion of a molecule is one that is typically chargepolarized and capable of hydrogen bonding, enabling it to dissolve more readily in water. By combining the beads’ molecular structure with a proprietary detergent solution, dirt from soiled items is attracted and absorbed by the beads, producing cleaner results. These reusable beads have a lifespan of hundreds of washes before being collected and recycled.
The benefits of a polymer bead cleaning system include both immediate savings from decreased laundry costs and savings over time from an increased useful life of linens.
By converting in-house laundry operations to a polymer bead washing system, hotels can cut laundry costs by up to 50 percent or more with immediate savings in water, energy and detergents.
Tough stains are removed better with this new technology, the linens can be used for longer periods of time. The polymer bead cleaning solutionoutperforms traditional washing methods with today’s laundry machines. As a result, hotels can deliver cleaner linens to their guests and keep their inventory in circulation longer.
Ozone Technology
accomplished by bleaching with chlorine at high temperatures along with mechanical action. This bleach is normally a slow reactant at cold temperatures, so hot water is used in conventional washers to enhance the oxidation reaction of chlorine bleach. Ozone O3 which has the property of releasing Nascent Oxygen [O] which can be used as disinfect the linen and can act as a substitute for chlorine bleach.
Ozone is simply an active form of oxygen. An ozone molecule is made up of three oxygen atoms (O3). To create ozone we first start with oxygen in its commonly known structure, O2. O2 is then split into its original atoms [O] using a designated energy field. Oxygen atoms do not like to roam independently, so they cling to other oxygen molecules to form O3 (Ozone). Ozone (O3) is a colorless gas and powerful sterilizer that oxidizes mold and mildew, pollen, odors, and other airborne organisms upon contact, rendering them inactive, leaving behind as its by-product pure clean oxygen (O2) in the air. Ozone works well in cold water and reacts very rapidly. In fact, hot water is not necessary for most ozone laundry systems. Ozone sanitizes through a process known as oxidization, which is the chemical combination of a
substance with oxygen. Organics are typically found to be rich in electrons while ozone is electron deficient. Thus, the reaction is rapid, creating an oxide form of the organic that releases more easily from laundry material. Being a strong oxidant, adding ozone to the wash cycle allows you
to use significantly less detergent while achieving a superior cleansing effect. Because the detergent has been reduced, some rinse cycles to remove detergent residues may be shortened or even eliminated. And with less detergent, linens and clothes do not compact as much and they release less lint, adding to the life expectancy of the fabric.
There are countless environmental and economic benefits associated with ozone laundry systems. But let’s start with energy consumption. By eliminating the need for hot water (85-100%) and reducing wash times as a result of the removal of certain cycles, ozone laundry systems are able to yield substantial electrical savings while also allowing for increased production within the property’s facility. Ozone laundering has been determined on average to reduce overall water consumption by about 20% and detergent/chemical usage by around 40%.
This means a reduced sewer bill and far fewer toxic pathogens being distributed out into the environment than with traditional laundry methods. Ozone has been found to destroy bacteria 3,000 times faster than chlorine and has been proven effective at removing odors. So linens achieve superior sanitization and odor removal along with a doubled life expectancy as a result of the less damaging.
Ultra-sonic Technology
An innovation in the range of fabric cleaning is the energy-efficient ultrasonic washing. The principle of the new technology is based on cavitations and mechanic impact by ultrasound.
In ultrasonic washing the ultrasound penetrates directly into the fabric at a rate of 20,000 oscillations per second which results in mechanical action, and forces the unwanted substances out of the fabric. The particularly sophisticated aspect of ultrasonic washing is the fact that the superfluous substances are not only removed from the fabric purely mechanically but also by cavitation. The action of the ultrasound on the fabric produces periodic compression and expansion of the liquor absorbed by the fabric. As a result of this fluctuating pressure, microscopically small cavities are formed in the liquid. The subsequent implosion of these gas and water vapour filled cavitation bubbles creates locally extreme conditions, so that the bursting bubbles produce shearing forces, which remove the superfluous substances from the fabric at high speed.
Main advantages with respect to a conventional washing system:
- Deeper and quicker cleaning effect
- Low energy consumption
- Reduced water expense
- Reduced detergent and
- It does not damage the fabric
Technology trends and consumer awareness campaigns are helping establish more sustainable practices as the norms of hotel laundry. Enabling these shifts are the advances in detergent formulations for water-saving, low-temperature washes and abstaining from harmful chemicals in favour of more environment friendly options. With certification systems raising awareness, and consumers being encouraged to seriously consider the impact of each wash, these innovations will likely dominate the market in the years to come. And other innovations, such as waterless washes, may take us even further down the path of sustainable laundry.
Franson Furtado
Laundry Manager, Palladium Hotel