An update to regulations in specific safety applications in the US resulted in a loose fill soda lime method for CO2 removal no longer being acceptable. Molecular Products was approached by this customer base to design a pre-packed soda lime product to overcome this issue.

Molecular Products is the global market leader in the design and manufacture of carbon dioxide absorbers for the removal of carbon dioxide. However, the large majority of the pre-filled ‘plug and play’ product design has been for the medical market for use in anesthesia, so our expertise was in smaller scale products.

Simply scaling up small cartridges is not a satisfactory solution. To work reliably in emergency life critical conditions Molecular Products designed a large pre-filled soda lime cartridge to meet the needs of this market.

On a technical level this involved finding solutions to issues such as removal capacity versus pressure drop; an extended shelf life; ensuring that the packaging could ensure the performance of the product at the moment of critical requirement; and not being bulky.

Hi-Cap CO2 and HiCap CO are now commercially available and both demonstrate outstanding contaminant removal performance (carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide) in emergency situations.

They been very well received in the mining and shipping markets for use in mine safety refuges and emergency response vessels for ‘citadel’ crew protection.

These products serve a critical requirement in the market place and will potentially save many lives in emergency situations.