"Water quality is often taken for granted but, in our laboratory, it has to be spot on, even for glassware washing"
Last year (2001) Reckitt Benckiser, the manufacturer of household name products like Dettol, Harpic and Finish, invested heavily in a new research and development laboratory at its Hull health and personal care facility.
Here it is developing a new generation of products to build on its international brands such as Disprin, Lemsip, Dettol and Gaviscon.
Key to success is the quality of the water used in the laboratory.
"Water quality is often taken for granted but, in our laboratory, it has to be spot on, even for glassware washing" says senior scientist Mike Jackson. To provide that quality in the new laboratory Reckitt Benckiser turned to Elga LabWater, the laboratory water specialist of Vivendi Water Systems.
The water used for glass washing, and many other laboratory applications, is produced by an Elga LabWater Purelab Option E purifier.
The Option E combines reverse osmosis, organic adsorption UV photo-oxidation and the unique Adept electro-deionisation process to produce water of 10MW.cm resistivity, with a TOC less than 30ppb.
The result is contaminant-free sparkling glassware - even without the use of Reckitt Benckiser's world renowned Finish dishwasher rinse aid.
For microbiological work and analytical applications like liquid chromatography, TOC analysis and mass spectrometry, the treated water from the Purelab Option E is polished using an Elga LabWater Purelab Maxima LS.
The treatment process used in the Maxima LS includes ion exchange to remove the remaining ionic impurities, photo-oxidation to remove residual organic matter, a second ion exchanger and, finally, a 5000 molecular-weight cut off ultra-filter.
The resulting water has a resistivity of 18MW.cm, TOC less than 5ppb and bacterial counts below 1cfu/ml. In research and development, reproducibility of results is crucial, and compliance with Good Laboratory Practice is essential, Reckitt Benckiser make use of the RS232 port on the Purelab controllers which allows them to be connected to a datalogger or printer for recording on line resistivity measurement and temperature, and to confirm the sanitisation procedure.
"We've always used Vivendi Water Systems, not just for laboratory water systems but for full scale USP production plant." says Mike Jackson, "We wanted to ensure that water in the new laboratory was up to or better than current specifications, and the Purelab equipment gives us that assurance."
