Green cleaning

Parkers Dry Cleaning has gone green.

Since last October the company has been using an environmentally friendly system that uses a biodegradable cleaning fluid that requires no heat.

The clothes are dried after exposure to recycled, pressurized carbon dioxide, which doesn’t contribute to greenhouse gases.

“Clothes have never been dried in cold … before,” said Parkers president, Gary Fine. “With the new system, they gently hover in the machine and don’t get banged around which will reduce damage to the threads.”

Founded in Ottawa in 1876 by Robert Parker, the Fine family took over the business in 1977.

Fine bought the green technology while down at a dry cleaning show in the United States after he had heard about the unit.

“I was looking for something that would be environmentally friendly and this seemed to fit the bill,” said Fine.

Streets Co., the processes’ inventors, originally developed the green cleaning technology for NASA.

“They experimented using carbon dioxide and they found it worked but it wasn’t terrific,” he said. “Once they figured it out and finished testing using carbon dioxide, it was like a eureka moment.”

Baseball caps were added to the cleaning agenda after testing the green technology with different materials.  

“We are starting to get some good business by adding a completely new item like baseball caps,” Fine said. “Most people have never even thought about it.”

Previously, people would put caps in liquid dishwasher detergent to clean it, he said.

“We are trying to educate people on our green cleaning technology.”