Over the decades, security and quality demands surrounding carbon dioxide (CO2) production, testing, and supply has become more acute; in many ways, just the same as many things in life are requiring more justification, confirmation, and qualification.
Some years ago, some of the second tier or independent CO2 firms were using specifications as simple as an old USP version of standards, which was literally ‘bare bones’ and this very simple specification was often adapted to many sectors of the industry. I am thinking probably over 15-20 years back in this case.
Then, a real change in the industry occurred with quality demands, as driven by contamination incidents – that being, contamination was reported primarily by the beverage industry from gaps in the refined CO2 product, or constituents in the raw gas from the source itself. I recall some of these major incidents occurred in Europe, while I can also recall another incident which occurred from a coal gasification source in Tennessee in the US, an Eastman Chemical source which ran for years whereby the independent refiner/reseller sold via the major and independent CO2 firms to soft drink and other companies. There was also an incident sourced from a Cargill ethanol source, which received complaints due to process design; this was likely another soft drink-related complaint regarding quality and purity.
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