The effect of ozone laundry systems on linen degradation has to date been an unproven factor where those who favour ozone loudly proclaim the use of ozone increases linen life by 20%, whereas those who are against ozone say exactly the opposite!
At Ozone Technologies we decided to prove once and for all how the use of ozone washing compares to the use of hot water washing. We processed especially prepared linen swatches through a tried and tested method of detecting linen breaking strength at the Australian Wool Testing Association laboratory.
The results are startling to say the least!
Before you review the following figures it is important to realise that the OTEK ozone laundry system uses a very small amount of ozone trickled into the laundry machine over the length of the wash. Other ozone systems on the market utilise highly concentrated amounts of ozone forced into the washing machine at the beginning of every wash phase.
Therefore the results indicated below can only be applied to the OTEK ozone laundry system and cannot be used as a background for all ozone systems.
In summary the results from the AWTA, a NATA accredited laboratory, reveal that washing with ozone and chemicals in cold water has less than one third of the detrimental effect on linen than washing in hot water and chemicals.
In fact in this particular case the hot water wash did not pass AS4146-2000 standards, whereas the ozone wash came well within the required standard.
In practical terms this means that a 100 bed nursing home spending an average of 30c per bed per day ($10,950 per annum) on linen replacement may be able to reduce their linen replacement costs to around 10c per bed per day or $3,650 per annum, a saving of $7,300 every year.
