Tide Coldwater Detergent
June 17th, 2005
Wow – Tide has teamed up with the Alliance to Save Energy to produce a version of their laundry detergent that works in cold water. This is a huge development in household energy efficiency – washers draw huge amounts of energy when they use warm or hot water, and conventional detergents are only effective at higher temperatures. (for household energy usage, see this site)
Link to Tide Coldwater
This may be related to a European effort to make use of Antarctic enzymes – optimized to function at very low temperatures – in household products. Link
What might be some low-energy solutions for clothes drying? Some people air-dry, but the majority use an electric dryer, which is one of the top energy users in the average household – drawing more per hour than even central air conditioning. Vacuum drying? Stronger centifugal drying? Brainstorm!
Popularity: 5% [?]
June 19th, 2005 at 4:34 pm
I think the best method of cleaning would be something that eliminates water all together. In my ideal world, i’m thinking of a pot of chemically treated pebbles (much like dry cleaning). You drop your stuff in, the clothes are gyrated amongst these cleaning beads, the beads are sifted out, and you’re left with dry, clean laundry. But something, of course, tells me this is unfeasible/unrealistic—otherwise, it would’ve been done already!
this reminds me of the “dish washers of the future”. all the dishes are made of some special material. after used, they are placed in the “dishwasher”, which melts the dishes and burns out the organic matter/food left on the dishes. after being melted, new dinnerware is formed. while this idea saves water, it doesn’t do too much to save on energy! i think the individual trade-offs would have to be assessed before this idea could become useful.
June 21st, 2005 at 7:43 am
What about using your self-cleaning glass to make dishes? Using the technology on clothes?
Making things easier to clean means less energy and detergent when they get dirty.
June 24th, 2005 at 2:46 pm
rather than use nasty chemicals to reduce water while washing, i propose you make use of some sort of dirt-eating beasties a la Finding Nemo’s cleaner shrimp, Jaques.