Most of us are interested in finding green ways to clean our homes and offices. We buy eco-friendly cleaners and try to get the job done with as few chemicals as possible. But there are some areas of life where it might seem harder to ensure environmentally sustainable cleaning. When it comes to medical equipment, medications, foods, and other things that can be contaminated by biological, physical, or chemical hazards, how do we ensure that these are safe and sterile and still use environmentally sustainable cleaning methods? The answer lies in CO2 blasting, or dry ice blasting, as a safe and eco-friendly cleaning solution for industrial cleaning.
What Is It?
Dry ice blasting is done in the same way as sand or plastic bead blasting. A highly pressurized blast of air blows a stream of media–in this case CO2 pellets–at the surface of whatever is being cleaned.
Because of the pressurized air, the dry ice pellets hit the surface of whatever is being cleaned at supersonic speed. These incredible speeds create small explosions on the surface of the item, and these small explosions lift off unwanted materials such as chemicals, animal hair, viruses, and a host of other types of contaminates.
What’s Wrong With Other Methods?
Other methods of cleaning, such as sand blasting or water cleaning, can result in cross contamination. They also grind away at the surface of what is being cleaned, which can eventually damage items that must be cleaned repeatedly.
Sand, water, or soda blasting are also not environmentally sustainable cleaning methods. They create waste that has to be cleaned up and can even kill vegetation in the surrounding area. Chemical cleaning methods are frequently toxic and pose a danger to the cleaning personnel as well as being unfriendly to the environment.
What Is Dry Ice Blasting Approved to Clean?
The Environmental Protection Agency and the Food and Drug Administration both approve of dry ice blasting as an environmentally sustainable cleaning method and approved way to clean items. This type of cleaning is frequently used in USDA, EPA, FDA, and GFSI inspected facilities.
This cleaning method has been approved for us in medical and food processing equipment. It is also possible to use CO2 blasting without disassembling machinery, which saves time. Since CO2 does not conduct electricity or involve any mechanical elements or present a fire hazard, it can be used to clean in places where fire is a concern.
CO2 blasting can be used to get rid of contaminants of all kind–chemical, biological, and physical–including oils and paints, chemicals and pesticides, animal dander and hair, and viruses and bacteria.
Dry ice blasting is currently the most safe and effective method of environmentally sustainable cleaning for the food industry and many other environments.