Promoting the “green” of your linen, uniform and facility services requires detailing how your service protects our planet. TRSA.org guides you in this endeavor. The website shows your company how to achieve Clean Green certification. You get access to research that testifies to reusable textiles’ superior conservation vs. disposable counterparts.
Review this Clean Green page to determine your company’s preparedness to meet the certification’s standard for effectiveness in minimizing environmental impact. The program is recognized for its comprehensive approach to driving your company’s natural-resource conservation, thus enabling you to assure your customers of your sustainable practices. Clean Green certified companies attest to the fact that adhering to the certification process accordingly helps control operating costs.
You can follow two paths to earn the certification points needed to comply with the Clean Green standard:
- Implement many best management practices (BMPs) from a list of those that demonstrate strong environmental stewardship; meet the water and energy threshold appropriate for your laundry volume.
- Implement more specified BMPs and achieve either the water or energy standard.
To back your efforts, this webpage details BMP requirements, describes application and auditing processes, lists certified companies and advisory board members and provides case studies (practical applications) and data to promote your certified company.
In March 2024, a National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) public workshop examined opportunities to increase the use of reusable healthcare textiles (HCTs) for personal protective equipment (PPE) in healthcare settings. The National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) contracted with NASEM to produce the workshop. TRSA advocacy had prompted members of Congress to approach NIOSH on the need for healthcare facilities to maintain more balanced inventories of HCTs and their disposable equivalents.
The workshop provided opportunities to exchange knowledge and ideas among key stakeholders—including TRSA members, technical experts, policymakers, manufacturers and healthcare PPE users—and to explore the potential benefits and feasibility of achieving a better balance of reusables and disposables. Among the chief benefits: resource conservation and other green virtues.
This TRSA webpage includes links to the proceedings summary and related issue briefs (TRSA-authored), the full proceedings document (you can download the PDF or read free online) and a Washington Post article on the environmental sustainability and the cost savings associated with switching to reusables.
Links to research that enable you to position your laundered reusable textiles against disposable equivalents are found on this webpage. Chief among the accessible documents are reports of life-cycle assessments (LCAs): studies that prove reusables have less environmental impact from “cradle to grave.” These show that reusables conserve natural resources better than their disposable counterparts from the extraction of raw materials through manufacturing, use and disposal. LCAs linked to this webpage cover these products:
- Cleanroom Coveralls
- Isolation Gowns
- Napkins
- Shop Towels
- Surgical Gowns
Also accessible from this page: an explanation of how an LCA determines that reusables outperform disposables. For example, the page examines using environmental considerations when selecting isolation gowns. You’ll learn how energy and material use (and loss) in each process are quantified at each stage of product life. TS
