Eco-Friendly Cleaning

           

    The intention of this blog is to encourage a more eco-friendly world through the education and encouragement of the people who inhabit it, namely – YOU. Specifically, we intend to encourage you to become eco-friendly through the use of environmentally friendly household cleaners. This is often referred to as Green Cleaning, which Wikipedia.com refers to as “using cleaning methods and products with environmentally friendly ingredients designed to preserve human health and environmental quality.” To illustrate the harmful effects of cleaners and the importance of using environmentally friendly cleaners, treehugger.com offers these staggering statistics:

“Green Cleaning: By the Numbers

•   17,000: the number of petrochemicals available for home use, only 30 percent of which have been tested for exposure to human health and the environment.  

•   63: the number of synthetic chemical products found in the average American home, translating to roughly 10 gallons of harmful chemicals.  

•   100: the number of times higher that indoor air pollution levels can be above outdoor air pollution levels, according to US EPA estimates.

•   275: the number of active ingredients in antimicrobials that the EPA classifies as pesticides because they are designed to kill microbes.

•   5 billion: the number of pounds of chemicals that the institutional cleaning industry uses each year.

•   23: the average gallons of chemicals (that's 87 liters) that a janitor uses each year, 25 percent of which are hazardous.”

    Luckily, in this day and age, there are thousands and thousands of eco-friendly products available. These products range from the “Greenworks” line of household cleaners to thousands of products used with these cleaners, such as sponges and towels. Choosing eco-friendly cleaning products is just one step to a greener world. Beyond eco-friendly cleaning products, there are eco-friendly beauty products, grocery products, childcare products, and more. For those worried about the cost and effectiveness of the products, in addition to being eco-friendly, a lot of these products are also highly rated for their effectiveness and are sold at reasonable costs. These products are readily available for ordering online on websites such as http://www.ethicalsuperstore.com/products/ecover/ or in supermarkets such as Target and Wal-Mart.

    As I have shown, taking this small step to a greener world is not only easy for everyone to take part in, but it is cost-effective and healthy for the environment as well as the people in it.

-Aimee Engle

Works Cited

"Green Cleaning." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 07 Mar. 2012. Web. 10 July 2012. 

    <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_cleaning>.

"How to Go Green: Cleaning." TreeHugger. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 July 2012.

    <http://www.treehugger.com/htgg/how-to-go-green-cleaning.html>.