Do you know what's in the cleaning products you use? Many industrial cleaners contain toxic chemicals that can have adverse effects on the environment. When people clean their homes, businesses, dishes, or carpets with products containing unsafe ingredients, most of these harmful substances wash down the drain and into our wastewater treatment system. Phosphates are one of the most recognizable ingredients that appear in cleaning products. Here's what we know about this ingredient:

When trying to choose a safe and effective cleaner, it's easy to get disoriented with unfamiliar and hard-to-understand, not intuitive ingredient lists. Reading a cleaning product label often feels like cracking a code, with chemicals that sound intimidating and hard-to-pronounce names. And, invariably, the reader gives up trying to understand, and thinks "how harmful can it be? It can't be that bad if it's on the shelf in a grocery store."   Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) and Sodium Laureth Sulfate (SLES) are similarly-named chemicals that are often confused. They are commonly used as an emulsifying cleaning substance. An emulsifier is a substance that binds oil molecules with water molecules into a homogenous substance. Think, Italian Salad Dressing, the oil and water separate naturally, which is why you have to shake the bottle before pouring it onto a salad. SLS and SLES are commonly used in household cleaning products (laundry detergents, spray cleaners, and dishwasher detergents), these two ingredients may sound the same, but they are very different.

It’s likely you grew up with a container of bleach in your home. Most people are conditioned to think that whiter whites mean clean and that bleach is essential for laundry, cleaning, and disinfecting bathrooms and other surfaces. Have you recently checked the labels of your cleaning products? You may be surprised how many of those contain chlorine bleach.