Washington state begins ban on dishwashing detergents

[mattl]

Came across this and thought it was interesting. I hope it doesn't spread across the country.

http://www.bellinghamherald.com/102/story/442699.html

 

[whitekingd]

Leave it to Washington State to start up some crap like this!! I wish I could afford to move out of here. After all, I can't really afford to live here!! What to do!!!

 

[bajaespuma]

Welcome to Bush World!

Yeah, that's the problem right there! Residential dishwashers!! In the state with an out of control paper industry dumping yards of chemicals into the water systems daily! This country is losing its collective mind. The things big business and their indentured politians are getting away with these days is beyond belief.

 

[bajaespuma]

By the way, I love your state, I've visited there many times and I think Washington is beautiful, but Bush-ism has spread everywhere and big business is at war with the people of this country and winning.

 

[dalangdon]

As usual, there is a back story here which is not being reported. Low oxygen levels in the waters lead to not only algae blooms, but fish kill-offs, which affects both the tourism and fishing industries (two of our biggest industries)

It would seem to me that if they want to achieve better results, they should leave the dishwashers alone, and concentrate on the wastewater processing, but it may be that they are trying to reduce input from septic fields. A sizable chunk of Puget Sound (hood canal) has suffered from poorly maintained (or in some cases, non-existent) septic systems that discharge into the canal. When it was mostly small summer homes, it wasn't that big of a problem, but as more and more people have moved out there, it's been a real problem for local seafood industries. That's probably the drive behind this legislation - trying to avoid a similar problem in the San Juan Islands and Spokane River irrigation district.

Of course, a ban like this is ultimately silly, because people in these counties will just go to neighboring counties for dish powder, and when the state ban goes into effect, they'll stock up in Oregon. And with places like Victoria still discharging raw sewage into the Straits of Juan de Fuca, it seems like the sound has bigger fish to fry (if you'll pardon the pun)

But Puget Sound is many things: A series of essential maritime channels (most direct route to Asia!), a giant fishing site (Think Olympia oysters and Dungeness crabs, among other things), a tourism hotspot, and an ecological marvel. Because of this, it's the population center of an otherwise sparsely populated state. Trying to figure out a way for all of those interest groups to peacefully co-exist is almost impossible.

 

[gansky1]

Buy a bag of STPP

Everyone should stock up...

The manufacturers have seen this coming for a while now and will have all phosphates removed from their dishwasher detergent products by 2010.

 

[launderess]

Ban has nothing to do with George Bush, or the Federal government for that matter, but more of local and state issue.

Simply put phosphates can be filtered out of sewage water, and no matter how many bans are put in place regarding domestic and or commercial use, the human body still excretes the stuff in human waste, hence the requirement by the Feds for local water treatment plants to build systems to deal with the stuff. Problem is that building such systems is expensive, and local areas are trying to cut down on as much phosphates as possible.

Certianly recent developments in automatic dishwasher detergents haven't helped the cause either. Even Consumer Reports rated several "green" dishwasher detergents as having good to very good results.

IMHO the bans seem stupid as one must use more of a non-phosphate product to get the same results as dishwasher detergents with. Those hockey puck sized Ecover tablets are more per dose than what one normally uses say of Cascade or Electrasol.

As Gansky1 says, if one wishes to use STPP, purchase the stuff straight and have at it. Long as you keep your bulk supply very tightly sealed in a cool and dry area, it should stay stable for some time. Recently nabbed several boxes of vintage Calgon water softener (so vintage the boxes are have sliver wrappings), and for the most part all contents inside are free flowing. The one box opened to test the contents, left a Pyrex measure cup of water clear after adding one teaspoon. Will have to get some pH testing paper to see if the stuff has degraded down to TSP as another poster says happens as STPP breaks down, however so far so good.

Have found adding 1/4 teaspoon of STPP to dishwasher detergent (Cascade Pure Rinse), gives cleaner and clearer dishes, especially glassware. This even though always use the same rinse agent. Also find a bit of STPP keeps food bits from remaining on dishes.

L.

 

[gansky1]

L, where did you find your vintage Calgon? I found some a few weeks ago at a convenience grocery store not far from here. The boxes were a bit dusty, but the contents seemed OK - freeflowing and still granular. I haven't used it yet, I bought two boxes and left a third on the shelf as it has some staining on the label. Mine aren't as old as you found (silver label - do you know when that was from?) - mine were blueish with dark blue printing, marked early 80's. I bought out a couple of stores when Calgon removed the phosphates a year or so ago. I don't use it very often as I have softened water so my stash will last a long time.

Silver boxes - wow! Good find!

 

[launderess]

A Lady Never Tells

*LOL*

Picked up four boxes for about ten bits. Had to open one box slightly because wanted to test content; afer hearing about how STPP can turn into TSP.

As for age, cannot really say. Boxes say "Calgon and Calgon Water Works Wonders With Water are registered trademarks of
Calgon, INC.,Pittsburgh, PA, for it's vitreous sodium phosphate products.

Being all that may, directions on box speak more to soap scum and washing with soap than detergent, but does mention "soapless detergent".

Direction say product is excellent for washing skin, hair and fabrics.

Probably will seal up the box and then vacuum seal it and store it away with the rest as have tons of Amway STPP water softening compound and about four pounds of STPP to work through.

Remember the old Calgon, like you should have nabbed some before it was all gone.

L.

 

[nasadowsk]

Handle it they way Long Island did: Nitrogen removal sewage plants. The north shore's full of 'em, and they work amazingly well. They're pretty simple, too, just a few big tanks with some aerators and blowers. The blowers get noisy, - Port Jefferson has 'em in a acoustic lined room that's so sound dead, they could use it as a recording studio off hours The blowers sound like a 707 starting up when they come on, then *whoomp!* the air builds up and things just hum along...

(We did the pre EQ and post EQ tanks at Port Jeff, I liked that plant alot - built on a hill, great views, and went smoothly)

 

[oxydolfan1]

I'm getting so tired of these product changes that will do nothing to address the problems they are supposed to address.

 

[westyslantfront]

If necessary, I will add STTP to my dishwashing detergent. Or perhaps, I will find a Mexican dishwashing detergent here in Tucson. Currently I use Electrasol because of the chlorine in it. My dishes come cleaner than when I used Cascade.

Ross

 

[toggleswitch2]

~Handle it they way Long Island did: Nitrogen removal sewage plants.

WELL, if I had any guilt at all over my use of STPP, it's now 100% GONE!

 

[jetcone]

It's funny how all this came about

in the early 70's after negative feedback to DC about foaming streams and rivers a shift came in the actual surfactant used in laundry detergents and the foaming rivers & streams & lakes went away. This shift was voluntary in the formulators industry. The prior surfactant did not break down in nature.

Then the phosphate problem reared its ugly head with clogged waterways choking the fish out with Algae blooms, I remember seeing Lake Ontario & Erie then and you could drive along any part of the windward shore and see about 200 yards solid of dead Sun Fish floating. Disgusting smelly memory really.

So the detergent industry again voluntairily removed phosphates from their formulas.

Now no one ever did a study as to the actual source of all this phosphorus. So today we really don't know where it actually came from.

What is known is detergents had it.
Golf courses and Farms had it in large quantity.
Residential Lawn fertilizer had it.
And Human waste has it in large quantities.


And all about the same time as the voluntary removal occurred the water treatment plants mandated 10 years earlier were all just coming online to treat all this water entering the environment.

So no one really knows what happened.

With the quantities used in Golf and Agriculture I cannot see that the contribution of residential detergents was THE issue here.

All these conclusions and regulations are all very unscientific and unproven even though levels have obviously dropped in 30 years across the country.

So I say stock up on your STPP.

 

[neptunebob]

It's possible that the golf courses have cut their phosphate use - yeah right!

As a tennis teacher once told me: "Golf? That's not a sport"!

By the way, Calgon is another product no longer made in the Pittsburgh area.

 

[nmaineman36]

If you think about it can be a good thing. Look what they did to laundry detergents here in the States...alot of the powders work well without phospahtes. I have used Ecover powder and had great results with it. I have noticed that over time Cascade has been slowly reducing phosphate content. I know some people love the Electrasol powder and I have not tried it yet. I do like the 3 in 1 tabs with presoak ball. I toss one in the soak cycle in the Miele during the pots and pans cycle. They work well.

 

[westyslantfront]

I am sure that it will be a while before Arizona is affected and when that happens, I will just add STTP that I purchase from the chemical company to my dishwasher detergent.

Ross