Melt-blown nonwoven materials form the basis of a range of filters, fabrics and insulation that includes critical items, such as N95 masks. Worldwide, manufacturers produce more than 300,000 tons of melt-blown nonwoven materials every year.
To minimize the energy footprint of the process, researchers from 3M and the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory are leveraging Argonne Leadership Computing Facility (ALCF) resources to model and optimize the production of melt-blown nonwoven materials. The ALCF is a DOE Office of Science user facility at Argonne.
The researchers are aiming for an overall energy reduction of 20 percent.