Mettler Toledo launches ecofriendly approach to measurement equipment

Mettler Toledo, Columbus, Ohio, has introduced the GreenMT program, which measures energy and resource usage to determine a company’s global carbon footprint. The program has spawned an EcoDesign initiative that targets the full product life cycle. Specific goals are to lower energy, reduce materials and resources used in manufacture and maintenance, and promote resource efficiency. All along the value chain—R&D, manufacturing, transportation, point of sale—measurement equipment is designed with environmental factors in mind.

The company has applied the EcoDesign principles to its latest-generation EasyMax automated chemistry development system. It replaces the traditional round-bottom flask with reactor vessels of differing volumes to suit the job at hand. This approach consumes less reagents and solvents, reducing both costs and potential safety risks. The system’s integrated, solid-state heating and cooling system eliminates the previous need for energy-intensive external cooling devices like cryostats, resulting in overall energy savings. Exact temperature and sample control likewise make it possible to downsize reactors and substance amounts.

The firm designed its latest Safeline inspection machine with a more sensitive sensor in combination with an energy-saving X-ray generator, lowering overall power consumption by up to 45 percent and reducing total cost of ownership. Its effectiveness at measuring and detecting a problem before products leave the factory helps to avoid shipping and possible recalls of defective products, and hence energy wasted in transportation.