You don’t even need to be that concerned about the future of the planet (though why on earth wouldn’t you be?) either.  Much that is ‘green’ is also frugal and healthy.  Avoiding exposure to harmful chemicals is just as important for you, your kids and pets, as it is for the micro-organisms residing in our water-ways.

Personally I don’t really think it matters what your motivations are, so long as you do something to rely less heavily on bleaches and harmful disinfectants that do nobody any good at all.  Yes your toilet bowl might shine so bright you feel satisfied you are doing your job of keeping house and home spic and span.  But at what cost?

Re-evaluating your routines, and changing just one thing a month, to something a little more environmentally friendly will do you the world of good, as the one responsible for keeping the home clean too.  You don’t really want to be breathing in all those toxic fumes do you?

By looking for traditional ways to tackle the chores you can avoid both dangerous products, and also expensive ones too.  There are so many cheap cleaning options; from baking soda to scrub the bath tub, to white vinegar to disinfect your counter tops.  You don’t have to pay much for the greenest cleaners, and you don’t have to have a closet full of bottles you would rather your children didn’t get hold of.

And don’t think your new flower scented, organic product with its pretty green bottle is necessarily the best option either.  Think more basic than that.  You need to aim for:

• Non toxic cleaners
• No chlorine bleach
• Concentrated cleaners
• Recyclable packaging
• Readily bio-degradable ingredients
• Safe to use – and that means often choosing items designed to be used in the work-place, since they must pass far more stringent health and safety requirements as far as user exposure is concerned

More basic things to consider are:

• Using less water to rinse those products away
• Avoiding irritants (even natural ones) such as citrus oils
• What cloths / sponges etc are you using – can they be recycled or re-used?
• How sterile does your home really need to be?  There is far too much emphasis on doing away with every bacteria or germ in the home.  In some cases this is a must, but most of us live far more healthy allergy free lives if we come into some contact with these naturally occurring organisms.

Enjoy your clean home but not to the expense of your health (or indeed the planets), and make at least one change today towards more Environmentally aware green cleaning.

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Thankfully Commercial Green Cleaning is growing.  As businesses feel pressure to literally clean up their act, they are starting to employ more environmentally friendly contractors too.  This is great news for the planet and probably even better news for those that work in the cleaning industry too.

A few of the key things I at least feel more commercial cleaners should be thinking about are as follows:

• Focusing on safe cleaning products.  Due to the rules and regulations regarding health and safety at work, this tends to occur not so much out of choice, but simply due to necessity.  But still keeping those cleaning products non-toxic and safe to use is crucial for those people that actually carry out the work of keeping our work-places clean.
• Water usage.  Water is the key component for so much of our cleaning techniques, but since it is safe it is often neglected when thinking about the environmental impact of our activities.  Simple things like using less water with a flat-head mop and not rinsing in a huge bucket of water, can really help when you consider just how much floor mopping gets carried out in the average office block.
• Ditching paper towels.  As we have already seen microfiber cloths can be used and used again and most importantly need very little detergent to do a sterling job.  If commercial cleaning companies switch from chlorine contaminated paper towels to re-usable microfiber cloths they could have a huge impact on deforestation and save themselves money on wasted detergents.

Due to commercial businesses focus on profit some of the things we need to do to make our home cleaning more Eco friendly automatically get done.  Buying concentrated cleaners for example is a no-brainer within the cleaning industry but something more home-owners would do well to copy.

If you are trying to make your home more Eco friendly you should be trying to do the same at work.  Voicing our concerns in the workplace and requesting more environmentally responsible practices including the use of green cleaning contractors is crucial for promoting widespread change.

Commercial Green Cleaning is perhaps even more important for the planet than Green Cleaning at home.  But, still you want a healthier environment inside your house too.  Somewhere safe and free from toxins so do be sure to make the switch so we all end up with more Eco Friendly Homes too.

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Green Cleaning Basic Rules

Reduce, reuse and recycle is the catchphrase for any number of green and eco friendly ideas.  Keep it in mind when thinking about your cleaning habits and materials to be used too.

1. Reduce the volume of any cleaning product to use, you will still get the job done, but without wasting so much of your cleaners.  Reduce the amount of water you use too.  Use the shortest cycles and only ever run the washer when full.  Remember if you use less detergent you need less water to rinse it away.  Can you mop the kitchen with half a bucket instead of a full one?  Every time you use less of anything you are improving your impact on the world around you!  So think about what you can do without, it’s important!  In your home, in your office there must be a way to cut down on what you use. Call up a cleaning or removal company (skip hire London) if you have too many things you don’t need and see how you can recycle them or pass them on. Getting rid of the clutter will make it easier to keep your space clean without wasting energy and cleaning products.
2. Reuse anything you can.  Remember microfiber cloths are machine washable and will last months or years rather than the days or weeks of a sponge.   The essential Green Cleaning tool is of course old linen and clothing.  Any linens you were considering throwing out should be cut up and consigned to the cleaning closet.
3. Recycle everything you can and switch to those green cleaning products that come in packaging that is easy to recycle in your locality.

These three keystones of living a life kinder to the earth are relevant in so much of what we do it is easy to ignore them.  But when you are trawling the store for Eco cleaning products or ingredients to make your own green cleaners do not forget just how important these ideas are.  If you can use less, waste less and recycle more your chores will be far more Eco friendly even before we get around to working out which green cleaners are the most appropriate for you and your family!

Here endeth the first Green Cleaning Basics lesson!  Don’t worry there will be plenty more here where we want everyone to make their Cleaning Eco Friendly.

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2. So Many Different Green Cleaning Products
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5. Why Make Cleaning Eco Friendly?

You will really need to study the labels to ensure you purchase a green cleaning product that is up to your personal ‘green’ standards.  Maybe you want less toxic, more easily disposed of cleaners.  Or perhaps you want ‘all natural’ ingredients.  You may have keen interest in packaging; how easy it is to recycle, whether it is produced from post consumer recycled materials to begin with, or is it plastic free (a pretty tough one this).  For some the avoidance of petrochemicals is a must, or maybe you just want some super mild to protect your babies skin when you are dealing with the laundry.

The options are huge and to be honest no one range is likely to appeal to everyone.  We all have compromises to make between being less harmful to the environment, and our standards of cleanliness.  You must choose green cleaning products that are exactly right for you and your lifestyle.

An easy way to know exactly what ingredients are going into your green cleaning supplies is to use homemade remedies.  Now very few of us have time to create all our own cleaning materials.  But, switching one or two key items from pre-made formula to home-made Eco clean recipe can be done easily and with little trouble on your part.  If nothing else use baking soda to deodorize your garbage pail rather than usually extremely toxic deodorizer sprays.  Or ditch the windolene in favor of some vinegar and a microfiber cloth.  A few homemade recipes can really cut costs to your pocket and the planet and are a great way to supplement your other less than perfect green cleaning products.

Our desire to make cleaning Eco friendly and live more sustainable, less polluting lifestyles, is a noble one.  But we have to be realistic here and never forget that even one product changed is a help.  Choose or make one Green Cleaning Product today and who knows, next month you may choose another until by next year perhaps all your household chores are more environmentally friendly?

Green Cleaning Products at Amazon

Amazon now sell a wide range of green and Eco cleaners that may be of interest.

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1. Eco Cleaning Gadgets

Available in two types, one course and one more gentle these wiggly little scrubbers are designed to get into hard to reach corners and grooves and remove food and grime on all your kitchen tools. Perhaps the only way to thoroughly clean a whisk not washed immediately after use, the spaghetti scrub balls are designed to work without detergent or soap, thus reducing the volume of cleaning products you are using at home.

Importantly they dry quickly and fully so do not provide a home for mildew or bacteria like some cloths can. They use powder obtained from peach stones to provide a gentle abrasive power. This is something that has been used in face scrubs and home made cleaning solutions for years so we know it works and is natural and mild. Some of the Original Spaghetti Scrub Reviews confirm great results on glassware, plastics and steel. If used nowhere but to scrub the kitchen sink and faucets it would be worth the investment though, as all those little curves and grooves can be a nightmare to get really sparkly clean!

Goodbye Detergent Original Spaghetti Scrub

All the Goodbye Detergent range of products are designed to do just that, remove the need for detergents from your cleaning regime. Now I guess that most folks will still use some form of dishwashing liquid but you can definitely use a whole lot less with the spaghetti scrub even if you cannot give up the habit entirely!

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