Solvent recycling through an industrial solvent distillation unit, commonly known as a still, can yield significant benefits in terms of cost savings, waste reduction and environmental sustainability. If you are a manager or owner of a manufacturing facility, you may be wondering how you can maximize the advantages of solvent recycling and enhance your operational efficiency. Here are five practical ways to achieve that goal:
Solvents play a pivotal role in various cleaning applications, including parts washing and degreasing, as well as tool and equipment cleaning. However, with the increasing demand for sustainability initiatives, and heightened supply chain costs, running solvents longer before disposal has become a standard practice.
Unfortunately, as solvents are used and reused, they become more contaminated, which impairs the cleaning process, leading to longer cleaning times, and less effective cleaning results. This scenario, in turn, leads to increased costs in both time and manpower.
Understanding the Basics
If you are new to the Cannabis industry you may or may not be familiar with the journey of a cannabis plant through an extraction facility. There are a variety of methods – from solvent-based extraction to the use of steam distillation, liquid hydrocarbon and supercritical CO2 – that can carefully extract cannabinoids from the plant biomass.
In a fast moving, growing and rapidly evolving market, an owner and operator needs to carefully and thoughtfully evaluate how best to expend capital resources.
While there are many factors to consider, this article will provide some tips and important considerations to make an effective long term capital decision in support of your investment when selecting an extraction solution.
When working with composites, the development of sustainable operational practices is becoming increasingly important. The need to develop sustainable operational practices has become more significant, in part due to supply chain challenges, increasing labor costs and decreasing labor availability.
Acetone is a durable solvent often used in composite cleaning applications. Because Acetone possesses strong dissolution characteristics, it can absorb relatively high concentrations
of epoxy, polyester and vinyl ester in composite cleaning applications.
Eventually, the Acetone will become saturated with this epoxy, polyester and vinyl ester waste. Once saturated, the Acetone will need to be disposed of (incinerated) and replenished (purchased). Both disposal and acquisition expend the resources of a composite manufacturer.
Acetone is a potent chemical solvent that is frequently used to clean, degrease, strip lacquers, waxes, resins and paints. For this reason, Acetone is commonly used in varied industrial applications.
In composite applications, Acetone will dissolve and remove epoxy, polyester and vinyl ester resin from tools, brushes and surfaces. Acetone will effectively remove wax and grease for surface preparation prior to bonding.
Acetone possesses strong characteristics for use in composite cleaning applications such as:
As 3D printing adoption continues to expand, demand for IPA to clean parts is increasing in tandem. At Formlabs, we’ve increasingly been having conversations with customers about how to better incorporate sustainability best practices into their print operations. Concerns over the environmental impact of consuming large quantities of IPA, especially for companies printing with a significant amount of resin each week, have many looking for ways to recycle and reuse IPA.
Carrier Solvents in Extraction:
Ethanol vs Butane
It is true, both Ethanol and Butane (also referred to as Hydrocarbon) can be used to extract oil from cannabis and hemp. When considering which solvent to use, a processor should carefully review the safety, efficacy and working history of a given solvent in application. Operating costs can be masked and provide a false positive to select a solvent because it is less expensive to purchase, when, it is more expensive to use. This blog will explain some of these differences between Ethanol and Butane and will help guide a processor to make more informed and better decisions regarding extraction methods and carrier solvents used in these same extraction methods.
Industrial supply chains were seemingly secure prior to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Since then, they have demonstrated fragility and this has led manufacturers to think of supply chains differently and more creatively in order to increase production capacity.
