Solutions and suggestions for a sustainable and Zero Waste house cleaning, in this new chapter of our Zero Waste guide.
As we said while talking about Zero Waste body care and personal hygiene, choosing on-tap detergents for our floors and surfaces is a great way to make the hygiene of our houses Zero Waste.
Moreover, let’s not forget that a large majority of detergents can be homemade with ingredients such as vinegar, baking soda, lemon, water, and salt: an example is this Zero Waste degreaser. All we have to do is find the recipe we prefer and there you have it — raising even higher the Zero Waste bar. Our health will benefit from it as well, considering that the majority of the detergents used to clean our houses are highly aggressive and contain substances that don’t contribute to our wellbeing.
Instead of synthetic sponges and cleaning cloths, we can use old pillowcases, towels and kitchen cloths to clean your house from floors to furniture.
When it comes to more abrasive sponges, as we mentioned before regarding kitchen sponges, loofah is a great alternative, even if not 100% Zero Waste, it is very sustainable.
Have you ever taken into consideration the fact that a garbage bag is a piece of waste itself? And, because it’s generally made with plastic, it’s one of the most lethal.
In this case we are in front of an uphill battle. Let’s start by saying that waste like glass, paper and, in some cases, plastic can be stored in reusable bins, emptying them at the moment of garbage collection.
However, we do realize that it’s almost impossible to get rid of single-use garbage bags when we have to deal with general trash. Therefore, a solution could be to use compostable garbage bags for this type of trash.
In this case, we don’t refer so much to the gloves used to clean the bathroom or the kitchen – ones that we could do without, especially if we use natural detergents.
We’re talking about single-use latex gloves, “surgeon gloves” as many call them, that are usually used to clean the house and fulfill an extremely limited number of actions, including, paradoxically, picking up trash.
Let’s opt for washable and reusable gloves instead, perhaps waterproof ones.
The amount of microplastics (aka microwaste) that our clothes leave behind in the water every time we wash them in the washing machine is incredible. It’s enough that we soon may realize – in the majority of cases – what we wear every day is basically walking waste made of extremely low quality and highly toxic materials.
So to limit damage, especially when washing fabrics such as fleece, elastane, acrylics, and polyester, we can use a washing bag specifically made to prevent these kinds of microplastics from ending up in the pipes. These are bags that don’t limit the cleaning process but simply catch the fibers.
Alternatively, and even better, we can choose to apply a filter directly to the pipe.
And then, of course, let’s buy clothes that are made of sustainable materials, and that don’t release microplastics and toxic substances in the environment and onto our bodies.
Do you have some more Zero Waste suggestions and solutions? Write us! We’ll be happy to add it to our list and inspire always more people.
Keep on exploring our guide to how to live Zero Waste, visit all the sections:
This zero waste handmade deodorant is very easy to make and we’re to show you how to do it. To make 200ml of deodorant you need 3 ingredients: 300 ml of tap water 1 spoon of baking soda 20 drops of Tea Tree Oil If we want, other essential oils we like for scenting Of...
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