ANNISTON ARMY DEPOT, Ala. -- This month, Anniston Army Depot made great strides in reducing or eliminating an environmentally hazardous chemical, P-D-680.
The military specification for dry cleaning degreaser P-D-680 have changed, replaced with PRF-680.
The updated specification calls for degreasers that contain less than 0.5 percent Dichlorobenzene, Benzene and Trichloroethylene.
ANAD is currently testing a PRF-680 compliant degreaser in a few shops to validate its cleaning capability.
"The chemical we are currently testing, has no Benzene or trichloroethylene," said Patty Dodson, an environmental engineer with the Directorate of Engineering and Quality.
Dodson said the purpose of ANAD's recent change from P-D-680 is primarily to minimize the risk of exposure by employees. The new chemical eliminates the hazardous air pollutants and has no odor, both of which were problems with P-D-680, especially in shops with poor ventilation.
So far, testing has shown the new degreaser works just as well as P-D-680, however, because it is more refined, it is more expensive.
To solve the problem of cost, DEQ is retrofitting filters on existing cleaning vats to remove contaminants from the degreaser, allowing it to be used multiple times.
DEQ engineers hope to only have to change it our once a year, by using the filtration system.
The depot has approximately 60 vats utilizing these products. In fiscal year 2012, 51,532 gallons of P-D-680 were used on the installation. That amount is slowly decreasing as vats are fitted with filtration systems and contracts are approved for the new chemical compound.
Stacy Thornton, a lead man in one of the depot's artillery repair shops said employees in his building use the new degreaser on everything kept in-house and remove a majority of the grease from parts destined for other shops with it.
"It is working really well," said Thornton. "The smell is much better also."
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