The Clean Manufacturing Game Part 4 of 10

Are You Playing the Clean Manufacturing Game?
A 10 part blog series discussing important aspects of clean manufacturing technology and implementation strategy.

Cleaning up the Factory – Part 4 of 10

Advanced CO2 cleaning technology includes CO2 composite sprays (NOT Snow Guns or Sprays!), plasmas, hybrid sprays, centrifugal liquid carbon dioxide immersion systems, supercritical fluid extraction systems, and fluids purification and management systems. This technology is available in stand-alone, mobile, bench-top, robotic, cleanroom, and production equipment integration modules (i.e., CPUs). CO2 cleaning and surface treatment applications are diverse and include precision degreasing, departiculation, outgassing, drying, disinfection and surface modification and functionalization.

CO2 CleanTech delivers both lean and green waste reduction benefits to manufacturers including the elimination of toxics, reduction of cleaning steps, lower energy costs and improved cleaning quality and consistency, among many other benefits. For example, a major ball point pen manufacturer installed a CO2 centrifugal degreasing system to replace an ultrasonic PERC solvent cleaning system. The new CO2 cleaning system cleaned faster, better and allowed lubricating oils to be recycled back into the machining process. Annual operating costs decreased by more than $130,000 per year during the first year of service and resulted in more than a $1,500,000 in operating cost reductions over a 10 year installation period. In another example, a major hard disk drive manufacturer reduced cost-per-clean by over 70% by eliminating the manufacturing wastes associated with parts disassembly, aqueous cleaning and deionized water rinsing, and drying operations. In another example, a major printer manufacturer eliminated multiple cleaning steps with a single-step CO2 composite spray (solid-plasma) cleaning process, which increased product yield while eliminating a number of manufacturing wastes.

David Jackson is President/CEO of Cleanlogix LLC and serves as the Chief Technology Officer for Cool Clean Technologies, Inc, based in Eagan, MN. He may be reached via e-mail at david.jackson@coolclean.com.

Part 5 of this series introduces clean machining technology.