TDG Shipping of Flammable Sanitizing Wipes

Posted October 30, 2020

By: Kirsten Alcock, Manager of Product Safety, email

Understanding the shipping regulations and requirements is one thing I stress with my clients. It is important to know what you are shipping and how to ship it safely in accordance with the current regulations.

During this current pandemic, many companies are shipping sanitizing flammable liquids such as Isopropanol or Ethanol. Are you however taking this sanitizing liquid and impregnating it into a wipe? If so, you will fall under a different class and UN designation than a regular flammable liquid.

For clarification, I recently contacted the TDG inspectors for confirmation of how to ship wipes that contain these aforementioned liquids. I have seen many companies shipping wipes as a Class 3 and not a 4.1 so I went to the source for confirmation within Canada. As received from an inspector at Transport Canada, when you are shipping a wipe containing a flammable liquid, they would like one to use: UN 3175: SOLIDS CONTAINING FLAMMABLE LIQUID, N.O.S.

Note that there is the Packing Group II associated with this classification as well as the requirement to check Special Provisions 16 as well as 56. This is not a step you can skip.

Special Provision 16 advises that we must place the Technical Name of at least one of the most dangerous substances that predominantly contributes to the hazard within parentheses. So in this case of your sanitizers, it is very likely to be either Isopropanol or Ethanol. Please note that this is totally dependent on your formulation. There are also some disinfecting wipes out there on the market that are using quaternary ammonium compounds within their wipes so ensure you are placing the appropriate chemical within parentheses.

Special Provision 56 must also be looked at. There must be no visible liquid at the time the mixture is loaded. You also need to ensure that your containment is leakproof. Make sure the packaging will not leak through your overall boxes if you are shipping a few containers to a box.

For more information on the shipping of Dangerous Goods within Canada, please refer to the most current regulations available online or contact us. We are happy to contact the inspectors on your behalf for further clarification.

Contact:
Dell Tech
Kirsten Alcock, B.Sc. (Hons)
Manager, Product Safety Group
519-858-5074
kirsten@delltech.com