Are Unsafe Cleaners Being Used in Your Critical Environment?

Ammonia is an excellent de-greaser, cleaner and disinfectant. As such, it is a widely used — and even featured — ingredient in many commercial cleaning solutions. It is also a potential disaster in your data center.

From glass cleaner to floor stripper and spot remover to general disinfectant, manufacturers often rely on the “power of ammonia” to get surfaces clean. This may be the answer to streak free windows in the break room, but it poses a serious hazard in the data center.

Among its other properties, ammonia has the ability to efficiently dissolve copper. Copper, of course, is the heart of every circuit board, wire and connector in your critical electronics. Spills and over-spray of ammonia based cleaners can directly expose your equipment to this corrosive chemical. Ammonia can also be carried as a wet vapor or a dried salt via the high velocity airflow throughout the data center.

The ultimate risk to your equipment depends on a number of factors including the amount, time and chemical concentration of the exposure. Of course, the best approach is to simply keep ammonia out of critical environments.

You should insist that any chemical brought into the data center be ammonia free. Check the MSDS. Reject any product containing ammonia or ammonium compounds for example ammonium hydroxide or ammonium chloride. A specialty data center cleaning company will know to bring the correct products.

A professional cleaning company that specializes in data centers will have a cleaning procedure that considers all the risk factors found in critical environments. They will only use cleaners that are safe for use in and around high-tech equipment. Products should be safe, biodegradable and of course, ammonia free.