An environmentally friendly washing machine developed by a researcher at the University of Leeds (UK) is heading next year to hotel laundries and commercial dry cleaners. Stephen Burkinshaw, PhD, professor and chair of textile chemistry, discovered the technology, which is being commercialized by Xeros, Ltd., in Leeds. Xeros is collaborating with GreenEarth Cleaning to sell the technology across North America. Product development is being funded by IP Group, a London-based commercialization firm that has partnerships with 10 universities in the U.K. The project team claims the green machine needs just one cup of water to wash a load of clothes — 90% less water than conventional machines and 30% less energy. The work normally done by water is replaced by using thousands of tiny reusable nylon polymer beads, which attract and absorb dirt under humid conditions. The beads are placed inside the smaller of two concentric drums along with the dirty laundry, a spew of detergent, and a little water. As the drums spin, the water wets the clothes and the detergent loosens the dirt, then the nylon beads mop it up. The beads have a crystalline structure that gives their surface an electrical charge that attracts dirt. When the beads are heated in humid conditions, they lose their crystalline structure and acquire an amorphous structure so the dirt is drawn into the core of the bead, where it remains locked in place. The whole process takes about 30 minutes. When the outer drum stops rotating, the inner drum continues to rotate and the beads fall through a slot and are collected in the outer drum. The few remaining beads trapped in the folds of clothes normally fall into a collection trough while the laundry is being removed, and a vacuum wand can be used to remove them from pockets. “We’ve shown that it can remove all sorts of everyday stains including coffee and lipstick while using a tiny fraction of the water used by conventional machines,” Burkinshaw says. And the beads can be reused up to 100 times. “We hope commercial success could act as a springboard to move into the consumer market,” says Xeros CEO Bill Westwater. “We’ve been very encouraged by the response from people, but the proof is in the pudding and that means putting a machine into someone’s operations and justifying the savings.”

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Posted July 1st, 2009 under Tech Transfer

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