People purchase cleaning products to keep their buildings clean, healthy and hygienic. However, according to various reports and product material safety sheets, many cleaning products contain chemicals that are hazardous for human health and environment.

Typical cleaning products available in the market contain chemicals that are associated with eye, skin, respiratory irritation and other human health issues. And the concentrated forms of many cleaning products are categorized as hazardous waste, presenting potential handling, storage and disposal issues for the users.

When harmful or ineffective cleaning products enter the market, the legal system ensures a mechanism for the resolution and compensations. In the meantime, people may get injured, our environment may be compromised and the sustainability of our communities is challenged.

According to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) -

• Cleaning chemicals are the most frequent type of chemicals involved in poisoning cases reported to poison control centers in the U.S.
• The share of general-purpose cleaning chemicals is around 8 % of the total non-vehicular volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions in California.
• Millions of tons of cleaning products are washed down drains every month. These products contain toxic chemicals, which can find their way into our steams and lakes.
• A majority of the people spend more their 90 % of time indoors; hence, exposure to indoor environmental hazards has led to many health concerns.

Because of these various issues and health concerns associated with the cleaning products, consumers are now looking towards greener chemicals and the sales volume of these products is increasing. And with the increasing demand for environment friendly cleaning products, chemical suppliers are gearing up their efforts towards organic ingredients with the same effectiveness of conventional ones.

In the cover story of magazine C&EN (Chemical & Energy News), Assistant Managing Editor Michael McCoy points that "green" cleaning supplies were once the province of fringe industries but are now drawing the attention of big corporations in the United States and other nations.

More and more suppliers are producing consumer cleaning products containing organic or naturally-derived ingredients, and avoiding the use of environmentally-harmful chemicals, and generating less carbon dioxide during production and use. Consumer products giant Clorox has joined this bandwagon by rolling out a new line of green cleaning products with the earth-friendly name Green Works.

Under pressure from different groups including consumers, the government and the news media, chemical suppliers are working relentlessly to come up with new ingredients, which are both environmentally-friendly and perform as good as conventional cleaning products.

However, the road to green is not necessarily as smooth as it looks. For one thing, there is no proper agreement on what is considered as natural. In addition, environmental standards may vary from region to region. Still, there are clear signs that greener cleaning supplies will become more common and more competitive with conventional ones, a trend, which could result in a cleaner, greener future.