How To Spot Green Floor Maintenance Equipment

This article was originally published in Contracting Profits. 

How do you know if a machine is considered green when there are no green certifications for floor maintenance equipment?

Our very own Scott Keller, Education/Commercial Buildings Vertical Market Manager for Nilfisk–Advance, Inc. gives his take:

"For scrubbers you should analyze specifications related to water flow, chemical dilution ratios and sound levels. Also scrubbers that afford you the possibility of an onboard chemical dilution system are much more green than pre-mixing water and chemical in the solution tank. While it’s nice to reduce water and chemical usage if you are unable to actually remove dirt from the cleaning surface you are not really achieving a “green” facility."

Read the full article to see additional responses from industry experts.

How "Clean" is Your Green Floor Cleaning?

The goal of today’s green cleaning movement is to minimize impact on the environment, building occupants and cleaning personnel. One result has been a reduction in the use of potentially harmful chemicals when scrubbing hard floors in commercial and institutional settings. Intuitively, it might seem that the “greenest” cleaning is done with no chemicals at all.

However, maintenance staffs still need to meet the standard of clean required for their facilities—whether that standard is simply “cleaning for appearance” or a more stringent requirement for disinfection in hospitals and even schools to combat viral threats such as MRSA and H1N1.

Every floor cleaning challenge is different, and rarely is there a “one-clean-fits-all” solution. Download this paper to learn today’s myriad requirements for green and for clean, in relation to the hard floors found in schools, healthcare facilities, retail stores, office buildings and similar sites.

What Does Green Cleaning Mean to You?

Green cleaning doesn't just mean reducing impact on the environment. It means finding new ways to clean quickly and easily, while saving time and money. For example, our quieter floor machines allow cleaning during business hours, thus reducing overtime hours and cost. Our floor cleaning equipment features ergonomic design that reduces worker fatigue. We utilize gel batteries in many machines to avoid contact with battery acid. Our Smart Solutions technologies support water conservation, reduced chemical exposure and many other safety and environmental features add up to time savings initiatives for you. For more information on both the economic and environmental benefits of going green, read our whitepaper, Making Sense of Green Cleaning.

Through product innovation and an understanding of our customers' green cleaning efforts; we have developed the most complete line of green floor cleaning machines in the industry, including commercial vacuums, carpet extractors, and burnishers. For a closer look at how Advance defines and delivers green cleaning, download our Green Cleaning Equipment brochure. We also have a variety of other green resources, including more information on regulations and standards and sustainability.

Driving Down the Environmental Cost to Clean

For a green cleaning solution to be truly effective, the solution must successfully satisfy both parts of this phrase: the solution must be environmentally friendly while delivering the standard of cleaning required for your application. Ideally, green cleaning will minimize environmental and human-health impacts, while maintaining or even improving cleaning effectiveness.

While green cleaning typically involves practices aimed at reducing chemical, water and energy use, it also means finding new ways to clean quickly and easily—saving time and money. Adding sustainability goals to green cleaning results in a program that is also designed to help maintain the life of the building so that floor surfaces (and many other components) have the longest possible useful lives—which, in turn, minimizes resource consumption and waste stream contributions.

Share your green cleaning solutions with us!