What is Green Cleaning?

Green Cleaning is a new approach to janitorial services that offers better environmental performance and improved worker health and safety, while retaining the same sanitation quality as traditional, more chemical-intensive methods. When correctly employed, no "cleaning power" is sacrificed through green cleaning practices.


Why Green Cleaning?

Many cleaning products contain harmful chemicals that can have serious adverse effects on janitorial staff, building occupants, and the environment. Personnel handling cleaning products used to clean floors, carpets, plumbing fixtures, and other building elements can be at risk for a number of adverse health effects.

Janitorial products can cause harm to the environment during their use, if they are poured down drains, circulated through building ventilation systems, or disposed of outdoors. Environmental damage can also occur during the development, manufacture, and transport of these products. Possible environmental consequences of janitorial product use include:

Air pollution Bioaccumulation of toxic substances in plants and animals Endocrine disruption in wildlife, which reduces the ability to reproduce Ozone depletion Water pollution

Utilized correctly, green cleaning can help to reduce many of these health and environmental hazards.

How the Calculator Works     View Example

Users must input the following information about the building and current cleaning practices to use the Green Cleaning Calculator:

Estimate of carpeted area of the building. Estimate of hard floor area. Types and annual amounts of cleaning products currently used to clean the building (by weight in pounds). Current cleaning product handling and mixing practices. Changes to janitorial product use and cleaning practices that have been made or could be made.

Default values will automatically appear;  You should enter your actual values for each product that you use. The default amounts are typical for a building of 100,000 square feet. This default was chosen because it can be easily extrapolated upward to the range of office space typically occupied by federal agencies. The tool may underestimate chemical amounts for buildings that are much smaller than 100,000 square feet in size.

The Calculator analyzes this data and provides the user with summaries of:

How much total cleaning product consumption will decrease by adopting green cleaning practices. How much hazardous materials consumption will decrease by adopting green cleaning practices.

The estimated amounts of cleaning chemicals used and the environmental benefits predicted by the calculator are representative of typical office buildings. You can improve the accuracy of these estimates by entering your site's specific information into the calculator rather than using the built-in default amounts.

Special Considerations

During the transition to green cleaning products and practices, workers might initially use more "green" product than they should. During the transitional period, residues from cleaning products may create problems. It may take a while before the new, environmentally preferable cleaners work well. This delayed effect is particularly seen in glass cleaners. It is important to train cleaning crews to use green cleaning products in an appropriate manner. An effective training program will minimize the need for monitoring, and will improve environmental performance and ensure worker health and safety. Green Seal is an independent, non-profit organization that evaluates and certifies green products. Formulation data from Green Seal-certified products were used in developing some of the algorithms for this calculator. Other well-recognized green product certification programs, such as the Canadian EcoLogo and the US EPA Design for the Environment (DfE) Formulator Program, have also developed criteria for cleaning products. Formulation data from EcoLogo and DfE products have not been compared to Green Seal products to determine if they might produce different results with this calculator.

For More Information

EPP
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) promotes the use of environmentally preferable cleaning products through its Environmentally Preferable Purchasing “Green Cleaning” Web site. This site provides information for purchasers and links to green cleaning resources.

EPA—DfE
EPA’s Design for the Environment (DfE) is a partnership program working with industry sectors to minimize environmental and human health risks and to improve performance of existing and alternative products, processes, and practices. The DfE Formulator Program encourages and assists formulators in designing products with more positive environmental and health profiles than conventional products. The DfE Formulator Program sponsors the Green Formulation Initiative for Cleaning Products (GFI) which is trying to reach a wider audience with information on safer ingredients for cleaning products.

Green Seal
Green Seal (GS) is an independent, non-profit organization that evaluates and certifies green products. Relevant Green Seal cleaning product standards are GS-37 for Industrial and Institutional Cleaners and GS-40 for s Industrial and Institutional Floor-Care Products.

EcoLogo
EcoLogo is a widely recognized and respected environmental label granted by Canada’s Environmental Choice program. The program certifies several categories of cleaning and janitorial products.

GSA
This site provides information on purchasing green cleaning products through the U.S. General Services Administration’s supply system.

Center for New American Dream
This site offers a variety of resources for cleaners and purchasers, including a list of environmentally preferable cleaning products and information on the importance of using green cleaning products.

WRPPN
This site for the Western Regional Pollution Prevention Network provides a wealth of information regarding the dangers and health risks of commonly used janitorial products.

Cleaner Solutions Database
Testing performed at the Toxics Use Reduction Institute (TURI) Laboratory has produced a wealth of data on the performances of industrial and institutional cleaning products. This database can be searched to locate alternative cleaning products based on specific needs.


For information about EPA's green janitorial activities, please contact Jim Darr at darr.james@epa.gov or 202-564-8841.


Acknowledgements

EPA wishes to thank Eastern Research Group (ERG) and Thomas Barron for their support to create this calculator.