Green Living: Making Your Own Non-Toxic Cleaners

Back in 1991 I started teaching a series of classes under the broad heading of "Green Living". The classes came as the result of the naturally oriented column I was writing at that time and some local presentations in and around the Puget Sound region.

Probably one of my most popular classes from that time is one where I talk about all the ingredients in mass market cleaners and why they are not health promoting.

During this program I teach how to clean just about anything you can imagine with a select few ingredients, bought cheaply at the supermarket or in bulk if you know where to access these in your local area.

Of course now the big producers of mass market cleaners are flooding the market with their brands hoping you'll keep up their $10 billion market share. While these products aren't totally toxic, under the guise of green they still include some known irritants and toxins.

Generally most people aren't as interested as I am in reading the chemical index, a standard resource for the cleaning products and HABA crowd. You can find this in the library and you'd really be amazed and what you find. You can also look up things under MSDS (material safety data sheet) system.

The problem is that while single items may be "approved" the mixtures resulting from adding two or more ingredients together are not required to be tested for health or environmental risks.

Back at that time we prepared one of our Healthy Handouts© on the topic of making your own cleaning products. This might be something you'd like to purchase as it seems that you can save - on the average - over $400 a year doing some very simple things along these lines.