Produce dry ice where and when it’s needed
October 1st 2004

The latest equipment from Triventek enables industrial cleaners to produce as much dry ice as they want, where and when they want it, The benefits of frozen carbon dioxide (-78.6°C) as a blast cleaning medium have been well recognised, but the cost and logistical problems of transporting highly perishable dry ice pellets around the country have deterred many from taking up the technology.

Also, engineers wanting to use dry ice for its excellent cooling properties (628kJ/kg) for transportation, product cooling during grinding and shrink fitting, have also been put off by the previous cost and waste of stocking bought-in dry ice pellets.

Triventek’s PE45 pelletiser, coupled with the RE45 recovery unit,make it feasible for works engineers and industrial cleaning contractors to manufacture their own dry ice as and when needed.

By recovering up to 90% of the gas normally lost to atmosphere at the pellister stage, and by reducing losses of stored dry ice due to sublimination or evaporation, of the solid to gas, the cost of dry ice is also halved. The company says that dry ice cleaning can successfully replace grit, sand and other abrasives, high pressure water and hazardous chemicals.

Cleaning with frozen CO2 is thought to have been first exploited by the aviation industry when it was looking for a nonabrasive method of stripping coatings from aircraft fuselages.

Its non-abrasive characteristic has been taken up in cleaning moulds and dies where no dimensional alteration can be tolerated.The fact that the blasting medium disappears harmlessly as gas means there is no secondary waste to clear up or to dispose of.

The absence of moisture in dry ice is important when cleaning electrical equipment and other delicate materials or equipment.

Food factory quality controllers also appreciate the absence of moisture as the industry drives further to improve microbiological hygiene.

In side-by-side tests carried out by German specialist dry ice cleaning contractors, fresh pellets produced on-site were shown to clean contaminates significantly better and faster than pellets produced the previous day at a remote factory.