5 Ways to create a Healthy Home in Allambie Heights
Have you ever thought of your home as being healthy or unhealthy? While the principle of a healthy home might be new to a few of us, it is steadily gaining popularity with homeowners. A healthy home can include a variety of elements from building materials used to construct your home to using non-toxic cleaning products. Below is a list of 5 ways to help you in creating a healthy home environment.
1. Clean Air and Circulation:
Here are some unknown truths about the air inside many of today’s homes:
Indoor air pollutant levels might be two to 5 times higher than the pollutant levels outdoors.
Indoor air pollutant is among the top environmental issues today.
Australians spend up to 90% of their time inside your home.
Indoor air toxins such as tobacco smoke, pollen, mold, dust, and animal dander have the ability to create asthmatic and allergic reactions.
Listed below are a few ways to improve the quality of your indoor air:
Consider an Indoor Air Purifier. You can also set up exhaust fans in restrooms to help get rid of moisture and chemicals from your home.
Update the air filters on your furnace with the pleated filters that catch smaller sized particles. Change the filters routinely as recommended by the manufacturer’s directions.
You can also use indoor houseplants to assist in cleansing your home’s air. For instance, Boston Ferns clean formaldehyde from the air. According to environmental experts, formaldehyde is a colorless, strong-smelling gas. When present in the air at levels above 0.1 ppm (parts in a million parts of air), it might cause watery eyes, burning sensations in the eyes, nose and throat, queasiness, coughing, chest tightness, wheezing, skin rashes, and allergic reactions. Formaldehyde can be found in insulation, particleboard, paper products and many cleaning products.
2.Dust-proof Your Home:
Dust your rooms and knickknacks routinely with a wet fabric.
Dust your wood, tile, linoleum, and laminate flooring routinely with a dust mop or a vacuum made for hard flooring.
Vacuum carpets, rugs, and upholstered furniture routinely. Consider buying a vacuum cleaner with a HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) filter. A HEPA filter can getting rid of a minimum of 99.97% of all particles that are 0.3 microns or bigger. In addition, consider using a bag-less vacuum to avoid the direct exposure of dust when you change a bag.
Enclose pillows, mattresses, and box springs in an airtight, dust-proof cover.
Dust/clean ceiling fans routinely to make sure they are not launching dust in the air every time you run them.
Replace dust-collecting blinds and long drapes with window shades or washable curtains.
3. Use Natural and Non-Toxic Cleaning Products:
One way to ensure that the fragrances in your home are tidy and fresh is to prevent using harsh cleaning products, which can create fumes that might linger for days. Try using natural components such as baking soda, vinegar, soda water, and lemon juice.
For instance, to make a natural glass cleaner, combine:
2 teaspoons white vinegarone quart of warm water
Mix ingredients together and pour into spray bottle. Spray on surface and wipe dry.
4. Fill Your Home with Natural and Earth-Friendly Products. Below is a small list of eco-friendly products available on the marketplace today:
Organic cotton towels, linens, clothing
Mattresses bediing, pillows
Cork flooring, wool carpet
Sofas, chairs, ottomans
Toys and games for all ages
Pet products
Soap and laundry detergents
Organic candles, home decoration accessories
5. Use Safe, Non-Toxic Interior Paints that have very low VOC (volatile organic compounds) contentno formaldehydelow odor
Try using any of the above ideas to create a healthy home environment. Although the idea of a healthy home is relatively new to many, there are numerous resources available consisting of books, articles, and websites, where you can find additional information.
If you need environment cleaning services in Beacon Hill, North Manly, Brookvale, North Balgowlah, Frenchs Forest, Manly Vale, Narraweena, Killarney Heights, Forestville, Balgowlah and Allambie Heights, call us now!
100% Natural, Chemical Free At Home Dry Cleaning Techniques
Perchloroethylene, better known as perc, is used by 80 percent of dry cleaners in Australia as a solvent to wash clothing that are “dry clean only.” Despite its efficiency, making use of this chemical has been connected to a variety of health side effects and has recently come under heavy public scrutiny. With heavy regulation from relevant agencies, professional dry cleaners are seeking the use of a more secure chemical– liquid carbon dioxide– to provide a green laundry alternative. At-home dry cleaning kits such as are offering the alternative of inexpensive & environmentally safe dry cleaning, that lowers the energy-burning, waste producing processes that the professionals use.
The first step to green dry cleaning is replacing damaging chemicals with natural cleaning products. Perchloroethylene (perc) is a synthetic chemical that is made from a reaction between ethylene and chlorine. Like many syntheitic chemicals, it positions a risk to our health. Perc is a main nervous system depressant. Direct exposure to it can happen in the work environment or in the environment when it is released into air, water, land, or groundwater. It can also occur when people use products consisting of perc, spend time in dry cleaning facilities that use perc, live above or adjacent to these dry cleaning facilities, or bring dry cleaned garments into their home before they are properly aired out. Short-term contact can cause dizziness, headaches, queasiness, and inflammation of the skin, eyes, nose, and throat, while long term direct exposure poses higher dangers, including liver and kidney damage and cancer.
Liquid carbon dioxide
Liquid carbon dioxide (CO2) seems the most practical green dry cleaning solvent to replace perchloroethylene. It is cheap, plentiful, naturally occurring and can even be recycled from the industrial wastes from the manufacture of chemicals such as ammonia. Most significantly, direct exposure to carbon dioxide has no health side effects. The only drawbacks for dry cleaning with CO2 are that it does not clean as well as perc does and the machinery required to use it is very expensive, thus a higher cost is passed on to the consumer.
A virtue of environmentalism is moderation. That being stated, green dry cleanind is best accomplished if you do not dry tidy at all or limit the use ofprofessional dry cleaning by using at-home dry cleaning kits for garments with smaller sized spots and stains or that need to be freshened. Professional dry cleaning is a large process that utilizes a lot of energy and produces a lot of waste in the form of powder residue, sludge and wastewater. If the dry cleaner is still using perc (it is still allowed in the majority of states), these compounds are hazardous. At-home dry cleaning includes no greater than a cleaning cloth and your dryer. There are no damaging chemicals involved and no waste.
While perc is the most reliable dry cleaning solvent, making use of natural cleaning products and at-home dry cleaning can only be beneficial to our health and our environment.
Green Cleaning Gets a Boost with the Ultimate Cloth
No one would argue that there’s a growing consciousness about the impact that we, as humans, have on the environment. While much of the media’s focus has been on greenhouse gas emissions and the ways we can minimize our carbon footprint, less attention has been paid to the impact that conventional cleaning products and techniques have on our health and on the environment. Although chlorofluorocarbons have long been acknowledged as contributing to the depletion of the earth’s ozone layer, and have been largely removed from consumer products, traditional cleaning products continue to have a harmful effect on the environment. To that end, there has been a wave of “green cleaning” products entering the marketplace.
Traditional Cleaning Products
Many traditional cleaning products contain a variety of potentially damaging chemicals, in part because they are largely unregulated and in part because there are couple of labeling requirements. For instance, many cleaning products contain phosphates (which are also a main element of many fertilizers), which can infect water and rob lakes and rivers of oxygen. Likewise, many cleaning products with dyes and scents contain phthalates, and most incorporate other organic compounds into their formulas. Together, these chemicals can have adverse results on the neurological functions, respiration, and reproductive organs of humans and wildlife. Our use of several different cleaning agents at the same time (a window cleaner, a basin cleanser, and a toilet bowl cleaner, for instance) can intensify the products’ effects on our health.
Green Cleaning Products
In reaction to the growing concern about the chemicals in cleaning products and their adverse effects on our health and on the health of our world, green cleaning products are being promoted. Some companies that make green products ban specific chemicals, and others make it a point to completely disclose all ingredients on labels. What they don’t tell you, however, is that it’s absolutely possible to have a clean home without using any cleaning products at all. Cleaning without products might take a bit more elbow grease, but water alone will do the trick.
Why Water and a Cloth Works Just as Well
For the environmentally conscious, among the very best cleaning tools is a cloth – some would say the ultimate cloth – that utilizes mirafiber to produce a streak free, spot free, lint free, and dust free finish. Utilizing this kind of fabric means that you don’t have to use paper towels, which contribute to the waste that adversely impacts the environment. Additionally, this ultimate fabric is usually guaranteedto last 5 years, making it distinctly eco-friendly. Due to the fact that it’s washable and bleachable, it can be used over and over again on practically any surface, from windows and glass to stainless-steel and Corian. Generally, you just wet it, wring it, wipe your surface, and walk away. This ultimate fabric saves time, saves money, and, most significantly, assists in saving the earth.
Don’t forget that we are based in Beacon Hill, North Manly, Brookvale, North Balgowlah, Frenchs Forest, Manly Vale, Narraweena, Killarney Heights, Forestville, Balgowlah and Allambie Heights