Green Laundry News - New Surfactant

photo by evink @ stock.xchang

I'm a big fan of green cleaning - and I mean really green cleaning, using the things you've got in your cabinet anyway. But I must admit that there are some places I'm not so green - laundry detergent, for instance. I like my clothes clean, soft and sweet-smelling, so to that end, I use laundry detergent and fabric softener that gets them clean, soft and sweet-smelling. That may be changing, thanks to a new surfactant.



One of the biggest issues in laundry detergent - and lots of other cleaning products - is the surfactant that's used. A surfactant is an ingredient in cleaning products that "breaks" the water surface so that it can clean properly. Every type of soap has surfactants in it - laundry detergents tend to be very high in surfactants - and the ones usually used in laundry detergents tend to stick around in the water after it gets flushed out of the washing machine.

So what's a girl to do if she likes her laundry to smell sweet?
Well, The Ecologist profiles a new eco-friendly surfacant that is not only plant-based, but made in far more eco-friendly ways. It's even sourced in a more eco-friendly way, using plant proteins that are bought locally rather than from Asia. It's not available in laundry yet, but I may just give the hard surface cleaners a try and see what I think.