Today’s Tip from The Green Year: 365 Small Things You Can Do to Make a Big Difference: Use hydrogen peroxide instead of bleach when you wash a load of whites.
“Bleach is toxic to marine life and creates a by product called dioxin whihc is a known carcinogen and has been linked to birth defects. Once it goes down the drain, it’s impact is irreversible.
Hydrogen peroxide is just as effective for whitening your clothes but has none of the harmful environmental effects of bleach. In fact, hydrogen peroxide is simply water with an extra oxygen molecule. It is produced naturally in the environment when sunlight mixes with water.. Add a cup of 3 percent hydrogen peroxide to your wash as an inexpensive and color-safe alternative to bleach; your clothes will look great and you’ll be doing your part to safeguard marine life.”
Has anyone tried this? Thoughts?
I’m not going to do the research on this, but once your dish, laundry, bath, toilet water goes down the drain, it goes to a water treatment plant which removes toxins before releasing it. Of course, we should do things like using low sudsing soap so that there’s not so much “stuff” to remove from the water. But I think in this case you’re just substituting one chemical (bleach, hydrogen chloride) for another (hydrogen peroxide).
Hydrogen Peroxide is H2o2 — water is H2O. Hydrogen Peroxide is an unstable compound.
When hydrogen peroxide is exposed to light, heat, and air, it breaks down into water (H2O) and Oxygen. Nothing chemical about it. 🙂
I haven’t tried using it in my whites load but I am curious. Although one time it did remove stains from my faux wood 2″ blinds.