Standard laundry detergents don’t have environmentally friendly ingredients. For example, the average household laundry detergent product has phosphates in it. When you use the product in your washing machine, the phosphates end up in lakes, oceans, and rivers. As a result, many nutrients and toxins get added to the water.
Unfortunately, lakes and rivers with an abundance of nutrients will cause algae to grow in them. Anytime you have water bodies filled with algae, it reduces the amount of oxygen for the local fish. In addition, algae add toxins to the water that are deadly to the fish and other marine life. And if humans come in contact with this toxic water, it can make them sick or worse.
Phosphate-based laundry detergents are contributing to the depletion of our ecosystems. Dead fish and toxic water are not healthy for natural habitats or humans and animals. The only way to stop this terrible trend is to switch to a different type of laundry detergent. But which one?
You may find some laundry detergents without phosphates that will still have surfactants in them. Surfactants are harmful to marine life because they decrease the tension of the water surfaces in lakes, rivers, and oceans. It makes the water more toxic to aquatic life in more than one way. Not only does it eventually kill the fish, but it also deteriorates their outer mucus coating and makes them more vulnerable to bacteria and parasites.
The simple use of thick plastic containers does not help either. Most people have to purchase new laundry detergent products every 1 to 2 weeks. Unfortunately, many products come in non-recyclable containers, which only adds more pollution to the environment. You could try purchasing small paper packets of detergent, but they won’t provide nearly enough liquid to clean a big load of laundry.
The Solution
The only solution is to use green-friendly or environmentally-friendly laundry detergents. These are not your typical laundry detergent products that have phosphates and surfactants in them. Instead, they are detergents approved by government-sponsored environmental agencies because they have little to no harmful chemicals in them.
The ideal eco-friendly laundry detergent products are the following:
- Phosphate-free
- Phthalate-free
- Paraben-free
- Dye-free
- Surfactant-free
- Animal-cruelty-free
- Little-to-no plastic
- Natural cleaning ingredients
Of course, it might be challenging to find a laundry detergent product that perfectly matches all of these requirements. But at least you have some idea of what to look for when you shop for eco-friendly laundry detergent. Furthermore, even if the product satisfies half of these requirements, you are still doing your part in reducing environmental pollution and saving aquatic life.