The disintegration test is described as follows:
The test system consists of a box oscillating at 26 rpm,containing 2 liters of tap water or wastewater (optional) in which a single individual nonwoven wipe is run for 60 minutes.Subsequently, the contents of the box are transferred to and then rinsed through a 12.5 mm perforated plate sieve resting at least 2” above a surface. The portion of the wipe retained on the sieve are recovered, dried and analyzed gravimetrically. This measurement is used to calculate the percent of the wipe’s initial dry mass passing through the sieve based on difference.At a minimum, this test is repeated with six replicate wipes.
The pass/fail criteria is:
To be acceptable:The percent of the starting dry mass passing through the 12.5mm perforated plate sieve after 60 minutes must be greater than 60% for at least 80% of the individual replicates tested.
If the wipe manufacturers can pass the INDA/EDANA guidelines they are not misrepresenting their product, which is apparently part of what the court determined, as a matter of law not a matter of sewage management, and other things contributed to the blocked sewers leading to a lack of definitive cause and effect under law.
For anyone interested the 2018 guidelines are linked to this page and this one, and available at this page.
Note these guidelines are published by an industry body not a standards organisation!
Since our governments encourage self regulation and self regulation appears to be brilliant in construction and so many other aspects of our lives this might be just another case, but even though the wipes are a problem, under law they may not be misrepresenting; the suit focused on truth in advertising. With the industry bodies self regulating and the manufacturer passing the tests, what more can be written?
I trust nobody interprets that I am defending the wipes products, just pointing out what the courts have to contend with. This is a decent synopsis of the ruling.
