After the Swiffer Mop and Before the Vinegar

After the vinegar!

So I’m cleaning my apartment for the in-laws’ holiday visit and my kitchen’s tile grout looks filthy.  I use my Swiffer mop and then scrub with Clorox (the new Green Works version available in stores) to no avail.  In desperation, I seek google’s sound advice.  The solution (literally)?  One part vinegar one part water or a little baking soda paste.  It sounds homey and environmentally friendly and inexpensive, but does it really work?  Just look at the before and after pictures above!

When picking out cleaning products I try to moderate between price and environmental efficacy, so I have an assortment of ‘green’ cleaning products in my apartment.  Some work, some don’t.  But what seems to be most puzzling as peruse my way through all of the cleaning products I own is why have cleaning products in the first place?  Nearly everything I clean, as I think about it, could be easily cleaned with three fully biodegradable, non-toxic household items: lemon juice, vinegar, and baking soda.  The Do-it-yourself website, has a new Going Green topic on its side menu, has a great article called How to Clean Green which lists several recipes for green cleaners. Here are two easy and useful examples:

Carpet Spot Remover
•Cornstarch or baking soda
•Club soda
Blot the spot and apply baking soda or cornstarch immediately. When dry, blot with club soda and vacuum.

Glass Cleaner
•1 cup rubbing alcohol (optional)
•1 cup water
•1 tablespoon vinegar
Combine in a spray bottle and wipe clean with a newspaper. Alcohol hastens evaporation to prevent streaking.

And now, what about everything else.  Hand, dish and laundry soap, for example, isn’t as easy to make from scratch.  I personally suggest buying these products, unless you’re exceptionally handy, crafty an organized. Here are a few of my personal favorites and professional suggestions:

•Method brand soaps, as cliche as they sound, are easy to buy anywhere, use biodegradable ingredients, do not test on animals, use recycled and recyclable packaging materials and make use of government issued carbon-credits for their employee’s transportation and manufacturing process.  Plus, they’re smell great and come in cool-looking bottles!
•I use Green Works dishwashing liquid (water lily scent). It carries the Design for the Environment (DfE) certification, meaning the EPA screens all the ingredients put into the product and markets with the Sierra Club to endorse the ideas of preserving and protecting the planet. You want to hear the kicker? Green Works was created by Clorox! Proof that you don’t have to be anti-institution in order to be an environmentalist.
•For my wood flooring, I use Murphy’s soap; its biodegradable, kosher, cheap, and the bottles are recyclable.

•And finally, I suggested ECOS All Natural Laundry Detergent.  Its HE compatible, smells great, has a soy-based built-in fabric softener, and is grey-water safe (meaning you could use the left over water for your vegetable garden).  All this and it was on sale at Kroger’s!

As for my kitchen cleaning, my in-laws arrive tomorrow and I’m feeling pleased with my greening and cleaning! Word to the wise, you may want to use these cleaning solutions barefoot – its more comfortable and the grime from your shoes won’t be washed onto your newly cleaned tile!  Happy green cleaning!

The great societal debate about cloth versus disposable diapers isn’t as simple as it might seem. Concerned parents should consider the process of production as well as the disposal of the diaper, and keep in mind that the most environmentally friendly choices usually are the best for your baby’s health. While disposable and cloth are the most well known options, there are others to be aware of too. I have listed a few types of nappies, a brief description and some resources.

Cloth diapers: Cloth diapers are classic – my parents used them with me! They are well known for not being very absorbant. On the plus side these children tend to potty train more quickly, but are notoriously more messy. According to www.punpkinbutt.com, a baby will only need 3 to 5 dozen cloth diapers over a 2.5 year period. You don’t even have to wash them yourself! 42 of the 50 states have some diaper delivery services – they pick up soiled diapers and drop off clean ones! Finally, because their imprint on the landfill is minimal, a recent study released by ABC has found that cloth diapers are have a much smaller ecological imprint. Still they do require varying amounts of water to wash and dry them, this part is up to you and the efficiency of your washing machine.

Disposable diapers: Disposable diapers have come a long way. They are fully absorbant and comfortable, come in a range of sizes and colors, and are irresistable convenient. You may not know, however, that most disposables are bleached and made of unearthly plastics and toxins (like dioxin, Tributyl-tin (TBT)), known to contain carcinogens and cause athsma and rashes! And think of the amount of money and landfill space you could save by switching to disposables:

• In 2005, there were approximately 4.1 million births in the U.S.
• Children are usually potty trained by the time they are 2.5 years old.
• If these children go through 8 diapers a day in the first year on average and 4 diapers a day in the second year and a half
• 4.1 million children x ((8 times a dayx365days a year)+(4 times a day x548 days in a year and half))=20,459,200,000!
• Thats over 20 billion diapers if each of these children were to use disposable!

Thankfully, Bio-degradable, disposable diapers offer a third option, which may seem like a silver bullet but has its own downsides. While free of most toxins, they don’t actually biodegrade without the proper conditions (not a landfill). Still check out Seventh Generation or Nature Boy and Girl.

Joel’s words: Whether or not you believe carbon dioxide is the cause of global warming or not, it is harmful to the environment and reducing your carbon footprint is a great idea.

I evaluated myself at one of the several sites mentioned [Carbon Footprint], one that is based out of the UK but has data to compare me to my peers here in central U.S.A. The calculations for the primary emissions are based on a combination of metrics from the UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), the UK’s Department for Transport, and the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). P.s. it was fun.

I gave US dollar figures for various types of fuel (electricity, coal, natural gas, LP, others) use at home and the results:

Total for your home = 7.437 tonnes of CO2
Total for your cars = 3.124 tonnes of CO2
Total secondary footprint = 4.813 tonnes of CO2
Total = 15.374 tonnes of CO2

* The average footprint for people in United States is 20.4 tonnes.
* The average for the industrial nations is about 11 tonnes.
* The average worldwide carbon footprint is about 4 tonnes.
* To combat climate change the worldwide average needs to reduce to 2 tonnes.

The final stage of the evaluation reveals several options to donate to offset one’s personal carbon footprint!

Eat your vegetables… exercise… don’t smoke… don’t drink… reduce your carbon footprint… give to the less fortunate… meditate… volunteer… don’t pollute… plant a tree… save the planet… buy organic… buy local… help fight injustice…

You do what you can, but in the end – you’re just one person. Although one person’s actions can change the world, you, being one person, can only do so much. You can only change but so many habits at once… if they stick.

Besides, your choices make you who you are. Being different is your strength. Choosing to be different is, in fact, a sign that you are an intelligent person.

At the end of the day, the best you can do is the best you can do. Focus your efforts on what will provide the greatest benefit, and don’t worry so much about being perfect.

“I am only one, but I am one. I can’t do everything, but I can do something. The something I ought to do, I can do. And by the grace of God, I will.”

Edward Everett Hale (American Clergyman and Writer 1822-1909)

Happy Birthday, Green Options!

Green Options, that community of superheroes dedicated to environmental resources, education, and discussion, doesn’t have to fly around the Earth at an incredible speed, reversing our rotation and sending us back in time to make our reality better, cleaner and, most importantly, more sustainable. No, what the team at Green Options has been doing for us, while our beautiful planet revolves normally in the vastness of the universe for the past year, is combine together the expertise of a diverse group of talented individuals who are committed to ecology in the broadest sense.

There are many people to appreciate in the one-year-old GO project- from Publisher David Anderson and Senior Editor Jeff McIntire-Strasburg to the many blog writers and podcasters who activate their growing readership in amazing (and interesting) ways. The robust, link-layered posts bring us from our home garden to science class to Wall Street to the White House, with an eye toward internationalgreen trends, too. Don’t forget the kids on this trip!

I don’t know how he did it because the bottle was so BIG, but my son dumped ultra bleach all over the laundry room floor. I happen to have a nice sized laundry room (yay) but it happened to be a day with dirty laundry all over the floor (boo.) The dark clothes took it the worst. The bleach ate clean through (lame pun intended to cheer me up) a heavy denim skirt- making it streaking sickly yellow in color and weakening the fabric to shreds. A nice blue terry robe is now spotted and I expect the spots to weaken to holes in a few washings, too. I threw a bunch of stuff away, thanking G-d Above that no precious child got hurt. I was in the same area of the house but I was not in the laundry room itself when this all went down. Guardian angels must abound in my house, but this little incident really shook me up as a mom.

I “wiki”-ed bleach and this is what I came up with, in addition to the feeling of: “Whoh – I paid money to bring this into the house??!!” I made a mental note not to buy bleach anymore.

Since bleaches are strong oxidizing agents, they can be quite hazardous, especially when reacted with other common household chemicals. Chlorine is a respiratory irritant that attacks mucous membranes and burnsppm can be detected as an odour, and 1000 ppm is likely to be fatal after a few deep breaths. Exposure to chlorine has been limited to 0.5 ppm (8-hour time-weighted average – 40 hour week) by OSHA^[2] to the skin.

Sodium hypochlorite and ammonia react to form a number of products, depending on the temperature, concentration, and how they are mixed. ^[3]. The main reaction is chlorination of ammonia, first giving chloramine (NH₂Cl), then NHCl₂ and finally nitrogen trichloride (NCl₃). These materials are very irritating to eyes and lungs and are toxic above certain concentrations.

The warning labels should be printed bigger, I guess. I imagine there are some good uses for bleach. Like killing anthrax spores, according to the EPA. Which it was used for in October 2001.

But I also searched for bleach alternatives and I’d just as soon use them, especially with the good of my children in mind.