ALEXANDRIA, Va. — February 21, 2020 — HLS Linen Services recently affirmed its commitment to environmental stewardship by achieving TRSA’s Clean Green Certification. HLS Linen provides linen and laundry service to acute care hospitals, long term care, rehabilitation centers and mental health facilities throughout many regions of Ontario, including Ottawa, Kingstone, Belleville and Toronto, as well as in Western Quebec. The Clean Green certification reflects the company’s dedication to operational efficiency and sustainability. Linen, uniform and facility services companies receive this distinction by adhering to TRSA-designated water and energy use thresholds and deploying best management practices (BMPs) consistent with the ASTM International environmental laundering standard.

HLS Linen Services’ customers can be assured their reusable healthcare textiles are washed, dried and finished with processes that maximize sustainability and reduce greenhouse emissions. Clean Green certified operations demonstrate significant commitment to conservation and green operations through these BMPs:

• Recovering heat from drained hot water and heat dispersed from the process of warming water;
• Recapturing drained water from rinses for reuse;
• Using environmentally friendly detergents;
• Removing solids and liquids from wastewater;
• Solar energy and energy-efficient lighting;
• Recycling programs;
• Re-routing trucks to save vehicle fuel; and
• Spill prevention plans.

The Clean Green certification is valid for three years at a time. TRSA inspects laundry facilities seeking certification and approves documentation of their water and energy use and BMP deployment through production reports they submit to auditors during the inspections. TRSA’s certification management protocol includes auditor training by the association’s inspection program administrator.

Clean Green aligns with the ASTM International standard, “Guide for Sustainable Laundry Practices,” which recognizes key criteria for the certification as universal indicators of maximum sustainability in commercial laundry work. ASTM’s review of TRSA BMPs verified these as the most effective and practical techniques for a laundry to achieve green objectives.

TRSA members prompted development of the standard, which was vetted in the sustainability subcommittee of the ASTM Committee on Textiles. Top technical experts, scientists and environmental professionals from outside the linen, uniform and facility services industry reviewed the BMPs. ASTM is the global leader in developing and delivering voluntary consensus standards unparalleled in building consumer confidence in product and service quality.

“I applaud HLS Linen Services for their sustainability efforts and maintaining the highest standards in their production and delivery operations,” said Joseph Ricci, TRSA president and CEO. “Meeting all the criteria for certification is not easy, but this company is committed to industry-leading processes and technologies.”

Posted February 21, 2020

Source: TRSA

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — February 21, 2020 — Two TRSA member linen and uniform service operators and two associates (industry suppliers) are winners of 2020 TRSA Above and Beyond Service Awards. This accolade acknowledges both rare efforts outside the normal course of business, such as addressing a customer emergency or pressing need. More often, such acts are part of the normal course, but are especially responsive, empathetic or pleasantly surprising to customers, setting a higher standard for others to follow.

Alsco’s willingness to partner with a fledgling entrepreneur breaking into garment manufacturing prompted a customer to nominate Alsco for this honor. The partnership stands to benefit women in skilled trades worldwide, given Alsco’s international footprint. The customer, Seaspan Shipyards, Victoria, B.C., had received negative feedback from female employees about “unisex” coveralls and sought an alternative specifically designed for women. Such requests went unfulfilled until a Seaspan executive saw a CBC-TV feature on a junior engineer in environmental consulting who had started a business focused on developing women’s workwear. She designed a coverall specifically for Seaspan, leading to Alsco’s agreement for 3-time-per-week service of these garments to the shipyard.

In August 2018 when Hawaii was faced with back to back hurricanes, United Laundry Services of Honolulu continued to operate and serve its customers. Recognizing that hotels were filled with guests during a busy period, and hospitals were full with patients, employees continued working to provide uninterrupted service. As public and private transportation was suspended, the company provided stipends to employees who offered rides to bring in associates for three days. Meals were brought in for employees as all neighboring businesses were closed. Following this unprecedented effort, four hotels were so appreciative that the general managers of the properties brought in their chefs, who provided a special “Thank You” meal to the 600+ employees at United Laundry.

Working 80 to 100 hours per week, onsite for two shifts a day for six to seven days, for the better part of a year, Gerard O’Neill of American Laundry Systems (Derry, N.H.) completed in October 2019 the Cleveland (Ohio) Clinic central laundry upgrade. His 18-month involvement began by auditing the facility, then redesigning it and acting as project manager and primary laundry consultant. He ensured all equipment vendors and local union general contractors and subcontractors cooperated with each other as well as with the laundry management team. Major upgrades included electrical capacity, backup generator, new pits and trenches and new larger piping infrastructure, all accomplished without missing a delivery to Cleveland Clinic locations.

Six linen and uniform service operators nominated the Foltex USA (Irmo, S.C.) outpost of the Dutch flatwork machinery manufacturer for exemplary service: Faultless Healthcare Linen (Kansas City, Mo.), Morgan Linen Service (Albany, N.Y.), Morgan Services Inc. (Chicago), Royal Laundry (S. San Francisco, Calif.), Superior Linen Service (Tacoma, Wash.) and Unitex Healthcare Laundry Services (Elmsford, N.Y.) Foltex’s interest in a laundry’s specific product needs in regards to its process was praised—described as unprecedented in one company’s history with equipment vendors. Product development was described as “incredibly quick” in implementing the laundry’s suggestions. Another customer noted that Foltex will turn down requests for proposals if they feel a current product isn’t a good fit for a laundry.

The Above and Beyond Service Award is part of the TRSA Leadership Award series, to be presented March 25 at the 10th Annual TRSA Legislative Conference in Washington. Other accolades to be awarded there will honor members for outstanding community service, diversity recognition, plant operations, sustainability and workplace safety. For more about the TRSA 10th Annual Legislative Conference, visit www.trsa.org/legcon.

Posted February 21, 2020

Source: TRSA

HOUSTON — February 18, 2020 — Rice University engineers have one-upped their own technique to increase security for the internet of thing (IoT).

In truth, their upping is far greater than one.

Kaiyuan Yang, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at Rice’s Brown School of Engineering, and graduate student Yan He, have introduced a technique to make security more than 14,000 times better than current state-of-the-art defenses while using far less energy.

The Rice team’s technique, introduced with a paper and presentation at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco, is a hardware solution centered in the power management circuitry found in most central processing chips.

The IoT allows devices — kitchen appliances, security systems, wearable technologies and many other applications — to communicate with each other through networks. With the world on the verge of adopting them by the billions, the best possible security is paramount, Yang said.

Unfortunately, he said, any IoT device may become vulnerable to thieves, who could use it to gain access to entire households.

“Once they’ve found a hole, there are so many things they can do,” Yang said. “And they don’t need to get into a computer system or a cell phone. For instance, a thermostat connected to the network can become an access point to a home, a company, a hospital or a city.”

Last year’s breakthrough by the lab generated paired security keys based on fingerprintlike defects unique to every computer chip. “This year, the story is similar, but we are not generating keys,” Yang said. “We are looking at defending against a new type of attack that is specifically for IoT and mobile systems.

“In power and electromagnetic side-channel attacks, the attackers can figure out a secret key when your device is running without opening up the device,” he said. “Once they have your key they can decrypt everything, no matter how good your security software is.”

The new strategy leverages the power regulators to obfuscate the information leaked by the power consumption of encryption circuits, Yang said. “Every system-on-a-chip has multiple modules powered by the power management circuits, so the interfaces we need are already there.

“By replacing existing power management circuitry with our unit, we not only provide a much better way to defend against powerful threats, but also provide a much more energy-efficient solution,” he said.

Yang said the circuit should take no more room on a chip than current power management units, and as a side benefit will provide state-of-the-art power regulation. “I think it’s going to be a very promising solution thanks to its minimal performance and design overheads,” he said.

Yang said encryption-cracking hardware and software leveraging power and electromagnetic side-channel leakage are far too easy to find, “and there are YouTube videos to show you how to do this,” he said. “This is a real threat, and we’re in a fight to make it much more difficult and expensive for attackers to succeed.”

While Rice’s protective circuitry is improving with every iteration, he said it will take time for manufacturers to design it into their fabrication processes. “There’s all the interface and engineering stuff,” Yang said. “In terms of the concepts and principles, they’re all proven. It’s just going to be a long engineering effort.”

Posted February 19, 2020

Source: Rice University