The War against plastic waste

PipneyJane

Fire_Fox wrote: »

:eek:

Diluted vinegar is NOT a safe and effective household cleaning product. There are many bacteria and yeasts that thrive in acidic conditions. The full-strength vinegar that you are using was made by such microbes!

Effective cleaning or degreasing products tend to be alkaline and/ or contain detergents which help break down microbe colonies or cell membranes and their fatty food sources. That is why there are modern detergents or traditional alkaline agents in body wash, shampoo, bar soap, toothpaste, washing up liquid ....

Peppermint oil smells nice but has limited other benefits, even in a well formulated properly tested commercial product. Concentration, distribution, pH and many other factors are relevant. Please consider using your washing up liquid diluted to clean your kitchen and bathroom.

Good points, particularly the one that I've bolded, which can't be overstated.

Pure vinegar is fine against things that don't like to live in a weak acidic environment, e.g. certain fungi, like the one that causes dandruff. It's not strong enough to do much damage to anything else. Ammonia is better.

Peppermint oil is anti-fungal, so a useful addition to shampoo if you've got dandruff (add 5-10 drops per 100ml), or as a treatment for athlete's foot (either use as above to wash your feet or dilute 5-10 drops in 20ml of oil and apply a drop of that solution to your foot, rub in and leave). However, like most essential oils it can be toxic if used undiluted.

Both tea tree oil and eucalyptus oil are effective antimicrobials but only if used in the correct concentrations. In fact, too low a concentration of tea tree oil has been shown to cause microbial resistance. (NB: I use a commercial eucalyptus oil based surface cleaner, which I get my Australian family to bring over when they visit.)

- Pip

Angelfeathers

Use real nappies instead of disposables. The amount of washing is nowhere near what is sometimes suggested, and when they finally reach the end of their life (after many years and hopefully many babies) they will decompose naturally instead of surviving in landfill for hundreds if not thousands of years.

Nick_C

It is not at all clear that real nappies are better than disposals.

Angelfeathers

Nick_C wrote: »

It is not at all clear that real nappies are better than disposals.

I know there is still some argument about this, but the arguments against real nappies seem to be mostly pushed by the disposable manufacturers and also to be based on erroneous assumptions about how they are washed. Most nappies do not require boil washes and do not make up massive amounts of loads every week. They can be thrown in with a normal wash at 40 degrees (with the occasional higher one for hygiene), and drying them outside in the sun is free and helps sanitise them too.


Okay, they might take more energy and water in manufacture than disposables but a disposable is used *once* and then thrown away to sit in landfill giving off noxious gasses for hundreds of years. Cloth nappies last for *years*, can be used over several children and in fact get more absorbent the more they're used.


And when they do eventually come to the end of their lives, they will break down naturally. Win-win!

Nick_C

... and the arguments for real nappies are made by "environmentalists", who are following a belief system. Environmentalism is not a science, its a religion.

I've followed the argument for a long time. I read the 2005 report and the later "revision". You can't say the assumptions are erroneous. There is no evidence for that.

Real nappies might be environmentally better, if you wash them at 30C with your other whites, use them for 4 children, and pass them on to friends once you have finished with them. Some people will do that, others won't.

I don't think we should be sending them to landfill. We should be sending them for incineration with [STRIKE]every[/STRIKE] energy recovery.

Schemes to recycle disposable nappies are being developed, but the total environmental cost of these niche schemes is never clear.

Fiftys1

I used ‘real nappies’ aka terry towelling for two children in the 1980s. Not shaped in those days and still going strong as rags etc now with plenty of wear left. There are many arguments against incineration of waste which includes release of greenhouse gases so not progress with regards to reducing emissions as far as I can see. Reuse of a resource is way ahead of constant manufacture and transport of disposables not to mention financial benefits!!

Nick_C

Incineration produces CO2. Landfill produces CH4 which is far worse.

Energy can be captured from incineration.

Energy is used to transport mixed recycling, separate it, run the mechanical equipment in a materials recovery facility, build and maintain the recovery facility and the high tech equipment it uses, and transport the separated materials hundreds, if not thousands, of miles for further processing.

Some materials are definitely worth recycling. Others may not be.

Fiftys1

If you can reuse as an item already exists no need to recycle and use recycling facilities. If the item is originally cotton it can be composted and the very end of useful life.

Crafty_Lisa_Hampshire

Please consider using your washing up liquid diluted to clean your kitchen and bathroom.


Firefox - are you able to tell me how much washing up liquid I should use in a diluted solution or is it the same as you would use when doing your washing up.

TheBanker

Fiftys1 wrote: »

I used ‘real nappies’ aka terry towelling for two children in the 1980s. Not shaped in those days and still going strong as rags etc now with plenty of wear left.

When I was a baby my mum used 'real nappies' which were hand-me-downs from my cousin. They were then used for my sister.

Half a century after those nappies were purchased, mum still uses them as cloths.