Water is a polar solvent, so it’s great with water-soluble contaminants such as dirt, soil, soot, sweat, blood and biologicals. These are all things that you would get on your garment that visually you can see is dirty.
CO₂ is the opposite; it’s very good on oil-based substances, things that we’re seeing in the new structure fires such as lithium-ion residue, plastics, PAHs, tar, grease and paint.
We always say oil and water are opposites and don’t mix well; that’s exactly what water and CO₂ are. They don’t mix well, but each is effective on different types of contaminants.
Water is great at removing a lot of those heavy metals because that’s what we know to wash with.
We knew they were removing some heavy metals that we used to see years ago, because of the RPMs and how agitated the gear gets inside the washer, and the water just beating those particles out of the gear.
Whereas CO₂ is very light and airy; we pressurize the liquid into gas to about 900 PSI. The gear floats more in the drum rather than being banged up.
It’s very light on the gear and doesn’t degrade it as much as water, but it can penetrate all layers without separating them because of the low viscosity of CO₂.
Testing for PAHs is newer in the industry. We know PAHs cause health effects, including different types of cancers and other risks. These are the really nasty compounds.
Whereas water removes about 50–60%, CO₂ can remove them at a much higher percentage because it penetrates all the layers.
CO₂ is another tool in the toolbox. It starts from PER or gross decon right after a fire: donning your gear, washing, using wipes and then washing the gear.
Combined with what you do in the cab, CO₂ is very effective in reducing health risks.
We’re seeing that now. CO₂ is an optional specialized cleaning in the new NFPA 1850 and we are currently sitting on a task force that is discussing the differences in CO₂ and water wash and how we can go about testing.
I would say in the next five years or so, that’s really going to change and CO₂ will be added in.
With partnerships with ISPs like California PPE, we will service all of their customers and they’re open to taking in anybody else that’s also around the area that just needs CO₂ cleaning because our mission is really to help every firefighter.
We have facilities and will soon open two more, allowing us to service gear from across the US and, eventually, internationally.
With that, we will be able to service from our location if they send it in. And so, sending it in US dollars is only around $200 for a coat and a pant which is a very reasonable cost.
We’re responding to what the market’s asking.
CO₂ has a very low viscosity, about 1/10 of the size of a water molecule so it can penetrate all the through layers.
When tested, we can see that it’s pulling out all of those layers of fibers without destroying them because it’s able to unlock and penetrate through all.
We started out in 2015 when the Belgian federal government, which was testing what was in firefighter gear, came to us and asked us to do some testing in regard to preventing firefighter cancer.
Since then, we’ve worked with the US Navy and the military on ballistic vests.
And now, we’re seeing some firefighters in some cities having to wear ballistic vests when they are responding to fires and we can clean those as well.
We’ve also done some clean room studies, which is in the medical field.
So, there are lots of opportunity within the PPE industry that we can get involved with. We just feel that firefighter first is where it makes the most sense.
The most exciting thing for us is the testing with, say, a UL or an Intertech lab is solely based on samples they send us, and it’s limited on the number of heavy metals and PAHs they’re testing.
What’s exciting to us is we want to be able to get to a place with our lab where we’re doing real-world testing.
So, when people send us gear, we would be able to test what was on it, wash it and then test what was removed from it completely and be able to send those results back to the firefighters.
What excites us is what’s evolving and what we call real world testing from real world contaminants.
