Traditional washing machines need a lot of water and detergent to clean a batch of dirty clothes. It usually leads to wastage of clean water and adds more pressure to the already-degrading environment. Citing this concern, LG has taken up the responsibility of developing a completely waterless washing machine for the commercial markets.
LG Waterless Washing Machine Details
According to recent reports, LG has started the development process of the waterless washing machine. The South Korean giant started working on the project through a regulatory sandbox program after the Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy approved the trial of the technology. The technology involves using carbon dioxide as a replacement for water in washing machines.
LG has apparently found a way to turn environmental carbon dioxide from its natural gas form into a liquid state by a refrigeration and compression process. After turning the gas into a liquid state, the LG waterless washing machine would be able to wash dirty clothes using no water or detergent at all.
As for taking out the pollutants from the dirty clothes, the washing machine will use the viscosity and the surface tension of the liquified carbon dioxide. After the washing process, the appliance will be able to convert the liquid CO2 into its original gas form and reuse it for the next wash.
Hence, there will be no discharge of any kind of gas or detergent-mixed water with the waterless washing machine from LG. This would save a lot of water that is currently being used in households to wash clothes.
As for the availability of the LG waterless washing machine, the company will set up the first unit at its research lab after the development process. It will operate the machine for two years to test its capabilities before making it commercially available in the market.
[Editor’s Note] Featured Image: This image is merely a representation of an LG washing machine. The waterless washing machine is currently in the early stages of development and no prototype images were available at the time of writing this article.
Comments
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Sounds good but the technic is still not clear with respect to cost efficiency.🤔
Great revolutionary work. However what is the need for converting liquid CO2 to gas after the wash and again back to liquid for the next wash. So much conversion energy can be saved by just cleaning and storing the liquid CO2 appropriately.
Abe 5th fail. CO2 is volatile in liquid state and hence will convert immediately into gas. Thats the reason why your cold drink taste like sweetened water after few hours
a very big cylinder would be required for that purpose
Maintaining the CO2 in liquid form is more power consuming. Need to keep the temperature low for extended period of time
The act of cleaning the CO2 is very the act of it turning back to gas , because the contaminants are left behind as residue. Also the compression of the co2 a liquid form is what takes the energy, there is no energy required to maintain the liquid state as long as the pressure is maintained.
It is a dangerous process due to the high pressures within the washing machine capsule itself, so there is a danger aspect to this. The kinetic energy stored in a cylinder that isn’t correctly reinforced is considerable such as the door blowing off and killing someone.
If LG can solve these problems in a satisfactory way this is possibly the most amazing technology yet for washing clothes without using toxic chemicals and other detergents etc. As the liquid state transforms back to its gas state, if it happens quickly this will create an endothermic reaction resulting in your clothes freezing, it’s good damage some fabrics, so this would have to happen slowly over a gradual period of decompression. But no doubt the washing cycle time will be vastly reduced in any event since the amount of actual time required in a bath of CO2 to clean clothes could be a matter of minutes at most.
The ultimate invention! Hope it’ll be commercially feasible.
Very good invention. Kudos to our scientists I am very happy for the nature & mother earth with less pollution
Refrigeratoin. The halocarbons in refrigeration appliances contribute to the greenhouse effect. These gases prevent heat escaping from the earth and deplete the ozone layer that filters the sun’s rays. The greenhouse effect and ozone layer depletion contribute to global warming.
Amazing innovation from LG. Hope it comes in retail market soon…all my products are from LG. #happycustomer
Water leakage is not harmful. But carbon dioxide leak could lead to asphyxiation depending on location of machine within house. Also operating pressures may increase leading to safety hazard.
I think you are confused with Carbon Monoxide.
He probably is not. Carbon Dioxide is very dangerous if released in large amounts indoors as it can cause asphyxiation as the poster suggested. This is a well known danger in modern data centers where CO2 is used as a fire extinguisher instead of water – which otherwise would wreck the equipment.
You are confused with Carbon Monoxide.
No. See Pubmed carbon dioxide poisoning. It can cause tachycardia, convulsions, unconsciousness and death at concentrations > 10 %. It seems there will need to be adequate air exchange in case of system leakage.
Incredible innovation of the year
Mans knowledge is Blessings to biosphere
This looks promising but given the population and usability, it may take decades even after its development.
All the best to the team , making life good to better…God Bless
Reminds me of a IELTS listening practice test.😂😂
CO2 is very harmful for all living organisms. How will you prevent it from leaking into the laundry room.?
No. CO2 is a major component of the air that you breathe every day.
Compressing CO2 to liquid state (~ minus 70degC). & storage requires refrigeration, so it’s not low in power consumption. The technology of CO2 cleaning is used in metal surfaces which withstand temperatures however specially lower temperature withstanding capabilities of synthetic clothing yarn (& not damaging them ) requires demonstration
For the millionth time, refrigeration has nothing to do with the process when you compress a gas using kinetic energy. It is likely the initialisation sequence will require a block of dry ice which can be delivered anywhere in the country. This will then we allowed to turn into a liquid form and control pressure conditions within the machine. Then a compressor will be able to transform the liquid into a gas for cleaning and then back again. It’s a compressor does nothing to do with refrigeration although the by-product of hot or cold reactions is merely a part of physics. Ideally you don’t want liquid CO2 to be by cold you want it to be warm but liquid because of the pressure it is under.
This is crazy, the compressors, and condensers need will ear up ton of energy, not to mention the lubricant need is also a pollutant
Definately it’s a eco friendly waterless washing machine. If it is come into existence, it will join to weep the pollution through this CO2 liquid washing machine invention.
Waw. Completely out of the box thinking.
If it gets to reality, it will be a huge breakthrough on laundry industry
And the extraction of dirt?
Good news for husbands 😉
Indeed, especially for those of us already doing laundry.
Zabardast technology
Unbelievable🤔
Cleaning depends on solubility of dirt in liquid carbon dioxide, colors may also washed-out. 🤔
Nice, maybe a good idea for whites wash only
Very good@!@@@ but cost will matter,
Fantastic
Where do the contaminates on the clothes go?
Dirty clothes in…..clean clothes out…..where’s the dirty at?
I’m guessing the liquid CO2 with the dirt will pass through some sort of filter which will need replacement after a few cycles of wash. Can’t think of any other way.
Could be graphene filter
No filter required, as liquid CO2 is allowed to turn into its gas for the residue you will be left behind. The surface the residue remains upon likely be exchangeable by the end user, to be cleaned. Meanwhile the machine recompress the gas free of contaminants.
Might be more maintenance. The working part sound my science fiction then science. Costly
Hope it works! Good on them! 👍
Thank goodness at least one person is appreciative of the news. Rest are like the ostriches with their head buried in the sand. Unwilling to believe that there can be any out of the box solution.
Good news