MKS Atotech has been awarded with the 2022 Advanced Manufacturing Award in the category of Best Sustainable Project for its UniPrep® long-life, low-temperature cleaners.
MKS Instruments, Inc. announced the receipt of the Advanced Manufacturing Award 2022 in the category of Best Sustainable Project during this year’s MetalMadrid exhibition in Spain, for its UniPrep portfolio of long-life, low-temperature cleaners, suitable for many industrial water-based chemical degreasing applications.
About UniPrep
The UniPrep cleaning solutions utilize water-based chemical degreasing technology combined with special additives to degrade emulsified oils and fats in-situ, which can significantly extend the effective process life. UniPrep cleaners’ extended process life improves sustainability by reducing the need for new bath make-ups and wastewater treatment.
UniPrep cleaners operate at low temperatures, from as low as 20°C to a maximum of 50°C. Compared to conventional degreasing solutions operating at temperatures of 60 to 70 °C, MKS Atotech low-temperature cleaners can reduce the energy consumption used for heating by half. Electrical energy savings and lower chemical consumption due to the reduced number of bath make-ups result in reduced carbon emissions.
In addition to the environmental benefits, UniPrep long-life, low-temperature cleaners offer customers a range of economic benefits. The robust and stable cleaning processes require low maintenance and less labor deployment since the equipment is kept clean of oil and grease. Due to the solutions' robustness, stability, and lower oil drag-out rate the quality of cleaning and subsequent processes are maintained at very high standards resulting in a much lower rejection rate of finished products and increased bath life of the surface finishing steps.
The nomination criteria
UniPrep long-life cleaners were nominated in September 2022 for expert rating and public voting. The nomination criteria in the category of Best Sustainable Project were: Improving sustainability in industrial processes, reducing carbon footprint, and facilitating a circular economy.
“We are proud that our portfolio of UniPrep long-life, low-temperature cleaners has been formally recognized by such a committee of experts. Our goal in developing more sustainable processes is to help reduce the environmental footprint of our customers, make their production environmentally friendlier and more profitable”, said Brian List, Product Director Paint Support Technologies at MKS Material Solutions Division.