If we asked you how often you use minerals like diatomaceous earth, perlite, and vermiculite, you’d probably say rarely or not at all. However, you likely come into contact with these minerals every day without knowing it. Minerals play an integral part in the products we frequently use from what you eat to what you wear and how you decorate your home. Read on to learn how you use minerals every day.

How You Use Minerals Every Day

Personal Care Routines: Perlite

Perlite is one of nature’s most versatile and efficient minerals, formed by molten rock, also known as volcanic glass. This mineral has been a longstanding member of the cosmetic community, even well before the Microbead-Free Waters Act of 2015. Perlite Microspheres exhibit powerful abrasive properties, perfect for the formulation of personal care products for gentle exfoliation. The addition of perlite also improves the foaming abilities giving a richer lather and a glowing skin feeling and look. Products like body and face scrubs, anti-dandruff shampoos, shower gels, and exfoliating soaps are just some of the products that exhibit greater performance with the inclusion of perlite.

Your Clothes: Vermiculite

MicroLite’s water-based fire-resistant coatings are a family of patented products that provide a safe, environmentally friendly method of improving the heat and fire resistance of textiles. Its easy application and our proprietary binders allow for direct application on fabrics and other industrial materials to provide a fire-rated material. Coatings of vermiculite on fiberglass textiles have been shown to increase the service temperatures up to 1100°C. Have you seen clothes and other thermal textiles, like blankets, marketed as fire-resistant? They may be coated with MicroLite!

Driving: Vermiculite

Using flame-retardant materials is particularly important for the automotive industry where fire is a severe possibility in the event of an accident or malfunction, and MicroLite is also used in this application.  The easy use and high fire rating make vermiculite dispersions a flexible option for imparting fire resistance to nearly all automotive fabrics, like seat covers.

What You Eat and Drink: Perlite, Vermiculite, and Diatomaceous Earth

• Cooking: Vermiculite is a top choice as a fiberglass coating for home ovens, commercial ovens, and microwaves. Fiberglass on its own can withstand high temperatures, but when coated with vermiculite, it can withstand even higher temperatures and help keep your family safe.
• Meat: Vermiculite and diatomaceous earth are both used as animal feed additives. Vermiculite acts as a catalyst in animal feed, soaking up a range of essential nutrients and delivering them slowly to animals. Vermiculite is also used as a blending agent to retain free-flowing characteristics in a feed mix and as a bulking agent to control caloric intake. Similarly, natural diatomaceous earth is registered for use as an inert carrier or anti-caking agent for animal feed. Dicalite’s natural diatomaceous earth complies with U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and exceeds requirements set forth by the Food Chemicals Code (FCC). It even meets the Organic Materials Review Institute (OMRI) standards
• Fruits and Veggies: Diatomaceous earth is a near-pure sedimentary deposit consisting almost entirely of plant-available silicon, which studies continually prove improves the growing environment and quality. Expanded perlite also helps provide crops because, when used in soil and soilless mixes, it maintains consistent aeration and drainage for plant roots, prevents compaction, will not decompose over time and deplete soil nitrogen, has a neutral pH, and is free from weeds.
• Storing Leftovers: When you grab plastic wrap to seal your leftovers, you might be holding a product made with help from diatomaceous earth acting as an anti-blocking agent. Anti-blocking agents reduce the blocking force, providing a microscopic, rough barrier that minimizes the contact between adjacent plastic film surfaces, preventing the frustration of plastic wrap sticking to itself, wrinkling, and becoming unmanageable.
• Having a Snack: Your bag of chips might be packaged with help from vermiculite. Vermiculite can be used as a gas barrier to prevent contact between the contents of a package and contaminants like gasses, odors, and pollution.

Your Interior Design: Diatomaceous Earth

Diatomaceous earth is used as a functional, inert filler in many paints and coatings. It’s added to paint as a flatting and matting agent. In this application, diatomaceous earth controls gloss and sheen, extends primary pigments, adds bulk and strength, and enhances coating adhesion.

Your Pool: Diatomaceous Earth

Diatomaceous earth has a very small particle size, a high porosity, and a crystalline structure, making it an excellent filter media for pool water. In fact, it can trap particles down to the micron level and keep the water healthy and looking crystal clear. Our industry-leading swimming pool filter powder is classified as Flux-Calcined Diatomaceous Earth and removes impurities at a very high filtration flow rate, getting rid of algae, amoeba, bacteria, and other foreign matter quickly and thoroughly.

Choose Dicalite Management Group for the Minerals You Use Every Day.

Dicalite Management Group is an international industrial minerals company with a unique multi-mineral platform including perlite, vermiculite, and diatomaceous earth, represented across three brands: Dicalite, Dicaperl, and Specialty Vermiculite. Our sales and technical services team work closely together to ensure you are getting the right product for your agriculture endeavor. We know you’ll love the results of using our minerals, so we’d like to send you a free sample. Call us today at 866-728-3303 to request your sample and speak with a knowledgeable representative.