Environmental commitment
Pinguin Textilpflege has started various initiatives and has built and tested pilot plants in its endeavour to constantly use the most environmentally friendly processes according to the latest technology.
One example of our commitment is the conversion of our wet cleaning process to environmentally friendly operation. For this purpose, we have intervened in the wet cleaning process at various points. Thus, we do not simply leave our wastewater to Berliner Wasserbetriebe, but treat it ourselves in a specially constructed reverse osmosis system. It filters the used detergents out of the water in an innovative process. This enables us to reuse 80% of our rinse water and also to use our rainwater. A further advantage here is that the treated water is cleaner than the usual tap water in Berlin and no longer has any hardness. Especially in Berlin, which is known for its relatively hard water, this saves enormous amounts of softeners. In addition, this water can dissolve pollutants more easily by itself, which also saves detergents. As a pleasant side effect, your textiles are treated more gently and can therefore be used for longer.
We have also installed heat exchangers in our water circuit, which use both the warm wastewater and the warm exhaust air from the machine cooling system to heat the fresh water. This significantly reduces the energy requirements of the largest energy consumer in the cleaning process.
We were awarded the Blue Angel, the German eco label, in 2008 for the exemplary interaction of all these measures.
In order to further reduce our energy consumption, we have built several cogeneration units. These produce our electricity and feed excess energy into the power grid of Berlin. At the same time, the resulting waste heat is used to heat our fresh water, so that the energy of the natural gas used can be utilised to over 80%. For comparison: modern coal-fired power plants only achieve an efficiency of approx. 45%. In 2005, we were appointed climate protection partner of the Berlin Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IHK) in the highest category A.[1]
In our dry cleaning we exclusively use a hydrocarbon solvent (KWL). This is almost completely biodegradable and much more environmentally friendly than conventional detergents and therefore also more gentle on your clothes.
Another dry cleaning method is the elimination of odours, which is often associated with fire damage. In contrast to classical processes, we do not use any liquid solvents at all for this purpose, but use ozone. Ozone is an oxygen molecule which consists of three oxygen atoms (O3). The normal oxygen molecules in the air consist only of two oxygen atoms (O2). This gives the ozone the ability to react with the odorous substances in the textiles and to release them. Since the molecule is unstable, it then simply decomposes again into the normal atmospheric oxygen O2. There is nothing left but fresh air.
[1] http://www.ihk-berlin.de/linkableblob/814708/data/KSP_und_Programme_2005-data.pdf