"How Safe are Green Cleaning Products?": Los Angeles Times, April 28, 2008
Los Angeles Times, April 28, 2008
JENNIFER MARTINÉ threw a party Thursday night, and her guests
brought food, wine -- and empty spray bottles.
Using vinegar, baking soda, essential oils and castile soap, they
spent the evening making batches of natural household cleaners. Martiné, 28, is
one of more than 100 women who've signed up to host so-called green cleaning
parties across the country this spring, part of a nationwide campaign led by
Women’s Voices for the Earth, a nonprofit group based in Missoula, Mont.
Martiné's interest in green cleaning stemmed from reading that
mopping agents might harm her new puppy -- and coming home one day to find that
her husband had passed out while cleaning their unventilated bathroom. He had
been using a combination of products and had hit his head as he fell to the
floor. He was just coming to when Martiné, a food photographer, returned home
to San Francisco.
"It was really scary," she said. Her husband, Tyler,
suffered no other problems, but the incident had at least one lasting effect.
"I definitely don't buy those strong cleaners anymore," Martiné said.
Like her, a growing number of Americans are seeking so-called
green cleaners -- products made with natural, nontoxic, biodegradable
ingredients. Few consumers may be going the straight DIY route, but sales of
natural cleaning products totaled $105 million during the last 12 months, up
23% over the previous 12 months, according to SPINS, a Schaumburg, Ill.-based
market research and consulting firm for the natural products industry.
Such cleaners make a variety of claims. Some promise that they
contain natural (instead of synthetic) agents, break down quickly in the
environment or pose less of a toxic threat to humans and ecosystems than do
traditional cleaners. Others say they're concentrated, packaged in recycled or
recyclable materials, have never been tested on animals or are free of specific
chemicals, such as petroleum distillates, phthalates, phosphates or CFCs.
(Never mind that CFCs, proved to deplete the Earth's ozone layer, have been
banned for decades.)
Many of them also typically eschew known asthma triggers, common
in many household cleaners, such as chlorine bleach and ammonia. Studies of
people who work with cleaning products for a living have indeed suggested a
link between conventional cleaners and an increased risk of asthma and skin irritation.
So-called green cleaners rely on ingredients such as hydrogen peroxide to kill
germs and remove stains, as well as citric acid and alkyl polyglucoside, a
coconut-based detergent, to break down grease and dirt.
But critics caution that just because the ingredients in green
cleaners are plant-based or natural doesn't necessarily mean they're safe. They
too can cause skin irritation or trigger allergic reactions -- and in a large
enough dose, any ingredient can be toxic.
And though green cleaners may purport to list all ingredients, the
market is largely unregulated -- which means consumers still must be wary of
what's in the bottle. Even cleaning products labeled "natural" may
contain some fraction of synthetic chemicals. Or they may contain natural
ingredients consumers would rather avoid, such as petroleum distillates, some
of which (namely, benzene) can cause cancer, and all of which come from oil, a
nonrenewable (read: environmentally unfriendly) resource.
"This is not a regulated space," said Matt Kohler, brand
manager for Green Works, the brand of green cleaners launched by Clorox in
January. "Any fly-by-night company can take a drizzle of lemon oil, pour
it over a vat of chemicals and call it a natural cleaner."
Focus on risks to humans
To most shoppers, going green is as much about their own and their
family's health as about the health of ecosystems.
It hasn't taken scientific studies to prove that chlorine-based
cleaners can irritate the eyes, nose and throat and harm living things. (Chlorine
is, after all, employed for its ability to kill germs.) But concern about other
ingredients' effects has grown.
In the 1970s, several states, beginning with Illinois, enacted
bans on phosphates in laundry detergents. The chemicals, which help produce
spot-free glasses and dishes, cause algae to proliferate in lakes, streams,
rivers and other bodies of water, eventually depleting the water of oxygen and
choking out other marine life. Some states are now passing bans on phosphates
in dishwashing detergents too.
In 2006, Wal-Mart announced that it would avoid stocking products
that contain nonylphenol ethoxylates, or NPEs. The surfactants, or foaming
agents, often found in detergents and other cleaning products, have been found
to cause reproductive defects, liver and kidney damage, and death in fish and
shellfish. In Canada and the European Union, but not in the U.S., regulations
limit the chemicals' use in cleaning products.
A variety of other chemicals are now drawing attention for their
potential to harm not just ecosystems but human health too. Environmental
activists have singled out such common cleaning ingredients as phthalates,
volatile organic compounds (VOCs), glycol ethers, quaternary ammonium compounds
and ethanolamines. For most of these chemicals, solid evidence of human health
effects is only just emerging.
In the case of phthalates, evidence has been strong enough for
lawmakers to take action. The class of chemicals, widely used in the plastics
industry to make plastics soft, are added to conventional household cleaners
(as well as cosmetics, bath soaps and shampoos) to help the products retain
fragrance.
Researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have
demonstrated that most Americans have detectable levels of phthalates in their
blood and urine, and preliminary findings have linked high bodily levels of
phthalates to sperm damage in men and reproductive defects in newborn boys. The
evidence persuaded California legislators to ban the chemicals from children's
toys, beginning next year.
The health effects of VOCs, volatile gases emitted by many
cleaning products (as well as paints, markers, building materials and other
products), have also come under scientific scrutiny. The solvents can irritate
the nose and throat and cause dizziness, and long-term exposure may have more
lasting effects. A handful of well-designed studies suggests a correlation
between exposure to VOCs and an increased risk of asthma or other respiratory
problems. In one, a study of more than 950 U.S. adults, published in
Environmental Health Perspectives in 2006, high blood levels of
1,4-dichlorobenzene, a VOC found in air fresheners and deodorizers, were
associated with measurable decreases in lung function.
But other chemicals targeted by environmental advocates --
solvents called glycol ethers, the disinfecting quarternary ammonia compounds
and detergents called ethanolamines -- have been shown to pose risks only to
people who work with high doses of the chemicals for long periods.
Cleaning for a living
In fact, most of the evidence suggesting that cleaning products
may pose harm comes from studies of people who clean for a living.
Researchers at the National University of Singapore published
results in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine in 1994 showing that
people employed as cleaners had nearly twice the risk of asthma as people in
other professions. A study of more than 15,000 working adults in Europe,
published in the Lancet in 1999, found a similar increase in asthma risk among
professional cleaners. A study by researchers at the Finnish Institute of
Occupational Health, published in the European Respiratory Journal in 2002,
found that professional cleaners were 50% more likely to develop asthma than
administrative professionals.
Such studies included people who cleaned streets, chimneys and
factories -- admittedly dirty, hazardous environments. Professional cleaners
working in factories or institutional settings also tend to use industrial
cleaners, which are more highly concentrated and stronger acting than household
cleaners. Nonetheless, researchers at Barcelona's Municipal Institute of
Medical Research have produced evidence suggesting asthma rates are increased
among people who clean homes for a living too.
In a paper published in the Scandinavian Journal of Work,
Environment and Health in 2001, the Barcelona researchers reported that
housecleaners were roughly three times as likely to have asthma, compared with
office workers. In 2003, they reported that women who had been employed as
domestic cleaners were twice as likely to have asthma, compared with ones who
had never been employed as cleaners.
In a 2005 report, the researchers showed that frequency and
severity of asthma symptoms in housecleaners was directly correlated with how
much bleach they used, though they could not rule out whether other chemicals
in cleaning products they used contributed to their symptoms.
People who clean for a living are exposed to such a variety of
combinations of chemicals (not to mention dust) over such a long period of time
that's it's nearly impossible for studies to pinpoint the cause of symptoms --
or to link them to individual chemicals.
That challenge is precisely what has some critics of the cleaning
products industry concerned.
Figuring out which chemicals are safe, and at what levels, is a
"highly imprecise science," said Arthur Weissman, president and chief
executive of Green Seal, an independent organization that certifies
environmentally responsible products and has helped Los Angeles County and the
state of California draft green purchasing policies. "We just don't know
that much about how chemicals act in the environment and in our bodies,"
he said.
Long-term concerns
The gap in scientific understanding stems from the fact that
chemicals included in consumer products are studied for their immediate toxic
effects, and they're often studied in isolation. In reality, however, chemicals
-- such as those in cleaning products -- are used in a variety of combinations,
and people are often exposed to low doses over long periods.
"We're not saying these cleaning products are going to kill
you tomorrow," said Alexandra Gorman Scranton, director of science and
research for Women's Voices for the Earth. "We're concerned about the
long-term and cumulative effects, what happens when you add all these chemicals
together over a lifetime."
Others are concerned that even limited evidence of toxicity
suggests some chemicals in cleaning products may be particularly dangerous for
kids, who spend a lot of time crawling on floors and placing hands and toys in
their mouths.
But industry representatives are quick to point out that health
problems occur only when cleaning products aren't used or stored properly --
and that the toxicity of any chemical is determined by its dose.
"This stuff isn't meant to be eaten, or drank, in any
case," said Brian Sansoni, vice president of communications for the Soap
and Detergent Assn.
Still, said Deborah Moore, executive director of the
Berkeley-based Green Schools Initiative, "if you have kids, why expose
them to a chemical that might be toxic if you don't need to?"
Heeding such consumer concerns, makers of natural cleaning
products have swapped out petroleum-based foaming agents for plant-based ones,
traded chlorine for hydrogen peroxide and opted for citric acid, tea tree oil
and pine oil instead of synthetic disinfectants.
Mrs. Meyer's Clean Day products, for example, contain ingredients
derived from corn, sugar cane and coconut in place of synthetic solvents , petroleum
distillates, bleach and phosphates. Seventh Generation makes a bathroom cleaner
that relies on hydrogen peroxide instead of chlorine for stain removal, and
Method's all-purpose cleaner relies on soda ash to break down grease and oil.
No standards set
But just because a cleaning product is biodegradable and made from
plant-based sources doesn't mean it's without its own potential adverse effects
on health.
"Certainly many natural chemicals are toxic too,"
Weissman said. Plant-based ingredients included in some green cleaners include
limonene (a citrus-based oil that helps prevent residue build-up), pine oil and
the foaming agent coconut diethanolamide -- all of which can cause allergic
dermatitis.
And in March, a study of natural and nontoxic consumer products,
commissioned by the watchdog group Organic Consumers Assn., found the suspected
cancer-causing chemical 1,4-dioxane in roughly half of 100 tested products --
including several dishwashing liquids with words such as "Earth friendly"
and "eco" in their brand names. The chemical is a byproduct of a
process that uses petroleum-based chemicals to make detergents less harsh.
"It's really confusing for consumers to try to understand the
claims of these products," said Moore, whose Green Schools Initiative has
helped several California schools buy greener cleaning products. "You need
a PhD to go to the supermarket and understand the labels on products."
The problem, critics say, is that labeling in the cleaning
products industry is highly unregulated. The use of terms such as
"green" and "natural" is monitored by the Federal Trade
Commission, which aims to ensure that such terms are not misleading to
consumers. But neither the commission nor any other agency sets standards that
products must meet before they can call themselves green.
" 'Green' and 'natural' are marketing terms -- they're not
terms of science," Sansoni said.
Cleaning product manufacturers -- green or otherwise -- are also
not required by law to disclose all of their ingredients on their labels. Some
green cleaner makers say they have disclosed all ingredients -- but there's no
way for consumers to be certain that they have.
Consumer advocates therefore have pressed for stricter labeling
rules, but the industry has resisted, arguing that long lists of ingredients
would create a potentially hazardous distraction on product labels. "The
safety and usage information is the most important information on a product
label," Sansoni said. "If you try to turn the label into an
encyclopedia, you obscure the most important information on there."
Proponents of greener cleaners, such as Weissman, say that if
cleaning products didn't include potentially dangerous ingredients, such
warnings wouldn't be necessary.
For now, green cleaning product manufacturers can opt to be
certified by a third party, such as Green Seal or the Environmental Protection
Agency's Design for the Environment program.
Some say these certifiers don't do enough to protect consumers.
"There are different shades of green," said Deirdre Imus, wife of
radio jock Don Imus, who has created a line of cleaners. She said that some
certifiers will give their approval to products containing chlorine or
petroleum-based chemicals, with labels that don't disclose all ingredients.
That pitfall isn't lost on Martiné, who's now cleaning her kitchen
sink with a homemade baking soda scrub.