Why eco-friendly products are not as green as they appear...

competitionscafe

Why eco-friendly products are not as green as they appear.

Faced with a choice between normal cleaning products and more expensive "green" alternatives, many shoppers pay more to do their bit for the environment.

But store chains and specialist manufacturers may be exaggerating some of their claims for "eco" cleaners and washing powders, a process dubbed "greenwashing". according to a survey by a consumer group today.

The claims of 14 "green" household cleaners, laundry tablets, nappies and baby wipes were put to the test by a panel of experts assembled by Which?
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/green-living/why-ecofriendly-products-are-not-as-green-as-they-appear-1957289.html

Ken68

Vinegar from the supermarkets is just as good...13pence a bottle. Seems to last forever.
A dash into the laundry too. Whole aisle's full of greenwash products, mostly hogwash.

moonrakerz

Ken68 wrote: »

Whole aisle's full of greenwash products, mostly hogwash.

I hope the hogwash has not been tested on pigs !

Ken68

Take away the excess salt , take away the excess sugar, the excess miles to get the food to the shop, the pesticides in the fruit and veg, the fat, the too many brands and the booze because it aint good for you, and the fags, you could get the whole lot on one shelf.

moonrakerz

Further to my last post !

Whilst walking back from the Vet's just now ( I am an animal lover !), I was giving further thought to the subject of "hogwash".

If a manufacturer were to produce such a product - just how would he test it to see if it was safe to use on hogs ?

If he cared about hogs he obviously wouldn't stoop to carrying out animal testing - so no trials on hogs, rabbits, monkeys or even water fleas (see another thread !) presumably ?

So would his only solution be to test this new product on humans and hope these results would accurately read across to how hogs would react to this product ?

Ken68

Yes, test it on politicians....

Mankysteve

The new sceintist ran a article about this a few months ago. Also looking at products you wouldn't think are ethical or green but actually are.

[Deleted User]

dohh my whole post disappeared but in a nutshell and when in my new house:

polti steam cleaner
eco cloths
eco balls
ariel brilliant for when eco balls just won`t do

We will be generating much of our own electricity so that will cover the polti steamer

I agree with the op. So called eco products in the main are just lip service by ever greedy manufacturers jumping on the bandwagon

[Deleted User]

mmm I have a kg of citric acid bought for making sqashes and I am wondering if that is good in the loo. I will try it because nothing I can find works as well as bleach and the loo has to stay and look clean but naturally I don`t like bleach

Ken68

http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/

Have just signed up for this mag, the ultimate I suppose is to use it as loo paper eventually. :-)))))))

paulwf

It's a shame companies like Faith In Nature (inc Clearspring range), Ecoleaf (by Suma), Orange Mate and Bio D weren't mentioned in the article as I would generally trust them more than a Tesco brand for example so it would have been interesting to see how they were rated.

With chemicals as far as is practical the best solution is to reduce their usage. Some aren't really needed such as air fresheners and most others don't need to be used too often.

I suspect with energy usage of basic appliances it's a case of simple physics...it takes a certain amount of energy to heat up water to boiling point and there isn't really much you can do to reduce that.