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Recently, a Phoenix-based hospitality company announced their launch of the first cannabis-friendly hotel in Las Vegas. Leveraging the legal adult-use marijuana sales that have been in place in Nevada since mid-2017, this new hotel will face unique climate control issues, to say the least.
As part of its press release announcement, Elevations Hotels and Resorts (the owner of new the pot hotel) provided details typically neglected in such corporate communications: The vendor of the air purification systems that will be employed in the rooms that allow marijuana smoking. RestorAir, a Chicago-based company that has been around for nearly two decades, manufactures and sells a small range of portable and installed (contractor-friendly) air purification units.
RestorAir Air Purification Systems
The company claims that its hardware produces "rapid remediation" of rooms and common areas that experience "intense flare up odors and must be turned around quickly." Sounds like a pot party to us. RestorAir takes a technical approach to air purification and odor abatement and claims that its machines also eliminate airborne and surface contaminants, including viruses and fungi.
Pertinent to the scenario of a luxury hotel that allows guests to smoke marijuana in their rooms and common areas is the ability of these machines to "eradicate virtually any malodor (e.g. smoke)."
More pertinent to the scenario of a luxury hotel that allows guests to smoke marijuana in their rooms and common areas is the ability of these machines to "eradicate virtually any malodor (e.g. smoke)." Not decrease or squelch. No mere reduction. These professional odor elimination nerds said "eradicate."
RestorAir claims that special oxidizers in its air purification units chemically dispose of smoke at the source, after it enters the machine, by breaking it down into carbon dioxide and water. This is a superior process, according to the company, than competing technologies, including HEPA filtration.
"RestorAir claims that special oxidizers in its air purification units chemically dispose of smoke at the source, after it enters the machine."
Neat tech, eh? Portable units of this type retail for just under $2,000, a price that makes them affordable for use not only by the hospitality industry in hotels, but also in residential applications—especially those involving multiple adults who fire up bowls, bongs, and joints of cannabis on the daily but don't want to smell like Tommy Chong's smoking parlor.
RestorAir notes that the technology behind its air purification hardware was described in theory in the 1950s and "brought to market, patented, and perfected by Ron Find and RGF Environmental in the early 2000s."
Digging into the Tech
Far from secretive, RestorAir provides enough detail on its website to cure a college professor of insomnia. But we're Higher Learning LV, so we'll break it down for you. These machines involve a precision "broad wavelength UV lamp" which is basically a special light that converts naturally occurring water vapor "into airborne molecules of Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2)."
The company says its units are effective against not only odor, but also a range of organics, including "bacteria, mold spores, viruses, smoke, fire smell, and more."
"This breaks the electron bond of the water molecule, forming hydro peroxides and other friendly oxidizers," explains the company. These friendly oxidizers are moved to the space within the device where the smokey air has entered. This is where they do their magic. The company claims that its units are effective against not only odor, but also a range of organics, including "bacteria, mold spores, viruses, smoke, fire smell, and more." Impressive.
When the friendly oxidizers like hydrogen peroxide come into contact with smoke or any of the organics listed above, the oxidizers break down the molecular chains of these chemicals. This molecular breakdown converts smoke and other odor-bearing organics to benign chemicals like carbon dioxide, nitrogen, oxygen, and water.
Thus, cannabis smoke—which often carries with it a pungent aroma that can permeate and taint clothing, drapes, carpeting, and other surfaces (especially over time)—can, according to RestorAir, effectively be eliminated with its machines.
To learn more about RestorAir and its line of high-tech air purification devices that are becoming increasingly popular in the cannabis hospitality sector, visit RestorAir.com.
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