Household chemicals versus organic cleaning products

May 2, 2007 10:23 AM

Help me figure out the true environmental impact of using household chemicals such as vinegar and baking soda versus using ecofriendly commercial products.

In the interest of keeping our toxins low and our house clean, I'm thinking of switching entirely to using things like vinegar, salt, baking soda, and borax to clean with. Right now I'm also using up the various commercially produced cleaning products we have on hand, but I like the results I'm getting with the vinegar and other items.

But it's all leading me to wonder: what exactly is involved in producing the giant jug of Heinz or store-brand white vinegar I'm buying? What is the environmental impact of producing a box of baking soda or borax? By using these products, am I supporting the industrial farming/mining/chemical industry in a way that using a "green" product like Seventh Generation would not?

It has occurred to me that the household chemicals can be purchased in bulk, where I might not have that option with some random organic cleaning spray and would thus be continuously purchasing plastic containers that have been shipped from who knows where. And after reading "The Omnivore's Dilemma" I'm not as married to the idea that organic is better, but do things like white vinegar and baking soda even exist in an "organic" form? And is it better to support a company that manufactures organic or ecologically sound products, or to support a company like Heinz or Arm & Hammer?

I kind of get the feeling that there are pros and cons to either choice, but I'd like to make an informed decision before I run out of Pine-Sol. And it's not like I can just go to the farmer's market and buy a bushel of locally mined fair trade borax and call it a day.

posted by padraigin to home & garden (8 comments total)

Unless they are using some kind of industrial shortcut, vinegar is absolutely harmless to produce. Well, the yeast that make the alcohol that turns into vinegar release CO₂, but then again it appears that baking soda production uses CO₂ (which makes sense if you think about grade school volcano demos) so it's probably a wash, so to speak, if you use both.
posted by DU at 11:00 AM on May 2, 2007

Ask Umbra over at Grist has an article about the enviromental impact of Baking Soda, and she has written a lot about green cleaning products in general. I don't see an article related to the environmental impact of vinegar or other products besides the baking soda, but you could always shoot her a question and keep your fingers crossed that she answers it.
posted by paddingtonb at 11:10 AM on May 2, 2007 [1 favorite]

If you're really that concerned about supporting Heinz, you can make your own vinegar. It's a very simple process.
posted by cog_nate at 11:34 AM on May 2, 2007

If supporting an "organic" business means wasting more packaging, I wouldn't assume (based on a green logo) that they're doing enough good in other ways to compensate. We switched to old fashioned concentrated cleaning basics a few months ago; the biggest savings is the time not spent going to the store for refills of those narrow plastic bottles things are normally sold in.

Also, my Pittsburgh in-laws would like to know what makes you think there's anything wrong with Heinz. ;) I find these old brands kind of charming, especially compared to nouveau hokey brands that make vague appeals to environmental sensitivities while selling overly packaged and prepared consumer products out the wazoo (talking to you trader joe).
posted by Doctor Barnett at 11:42 AM on May 2, 2007

For the most part I think the issues are going to be related to the energy consumed in production and distribution. It might be better to go with the Very Big Mining Corporation of America that has one big ugly hole in the ground, vs one of 5,000 cottage operations each with their own bit o' uglyness.
posted by Kid Charlemagne at 11:53 AM on May 2, 2007

Combine three concepts:
1. commodity chain which examines at all the components of production, transportation, to consumption.
2. ecological footprint which examines all of the environmental impacts on ecosystems.
3. socio-cultural footprint which examines all of the impacts on socio-cultural systems.

By combining these you are evaluating the relative impacts at the site of production and consumption (and in between). Each link in the commodity chain will have its respective socio-cultural and ecosystemic impacts, contributing to the overall impact.

For example, with cleaners you would be evaluating the social and environmental impacts of production of (eg apple cider vinegar) apple cultivation, processing, the plastic bottle, shipping method/distance, distribution mechanism and comparing it (eg eco-cleaner) the production of each of the ingredients, packaging and shipping.

3 sources for examples of these types of analyses:
Stuff
Tangled Routes
Consuming Sustainability (self-link)
posted by kch at 1:14 PM on May 2, 2007 [2 favorites]

Just regarding the white vinegar -- there was a short segment on the Food Network a while ago (I think it was on Unwrapped, with Marc Summers, who I can't listen to with a straight face because I keep remembering him 'sliming' people on Double Dare in the early 1990s) on how it's made.

Basically, it's all industrial chemistry. They start off with commercially manufactured USP-grade ethanol, and then they run it through some "secret process" (I suspect that it's a continuous catalytic process based on the shots of the equipment -- wikipedia confirms) which produces acetic acid. This is then diluted with water to 5%, and that's the "white vinegar" you buy in the store.

Aside from being done under tighter conditions and controls (since it's a food additive) than most household cleansers, there's really no huge difference. It's industrial chemistry either way. It's just the stuff you buy in the food aisle meets FDA standards as a foodstuff or food additive, while the same chemicals in the cleanser aisle don't have to, and are presumably less pure, made from 'rougher' feedstocks (maybe the ethanol comes from distillation of ag waste instead of edible corn or something), etc.

This is conjecture on my part, but personally I think it's probably "less green" to use USP/food-grade chemicals, if you don't need them to. That extra "nine" (e.g., 99.99% pure vs 99.9%) costs a lot in terms of energy, and energy isn't free and has an environmental impact. So if you can get away with using lower-grade baking soda (bicarb) or vinegar (acetic acid), there could be some benefit in doing it. Save the energy-intensive food-grade chemicals for eating.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:20 PM on May 2, 2007

My main beef with Heinz these days is that their ketchup contains high fructose corn syrup, and their organic ketchup which does not is 3 times as much as even the second most expensive brand of organic ketchup that's locally available.

If you want to support the eco-friendly companies (or those that purport to be), there are small brand equivalents of just about everything. For example, Bob's Red Mill makes baking soda that you can buy in bulk. I'm sure there's a white vinegar out there other than Heinz.
posted by Caviar at 8:50 PM on May 3, 2007