Bleach Alternative: First Test

Remember when I said that I am giving up bleach? Well, today launches my first foray into finding a bleach alternative!

The most common type of recipes that I am seeing call for hydrogen peroxide and an acid, specifically vinegar. I have a concern with this:

Hydrogen peroxide reacts with vinegar to give you peracetic acid.

Peracetic acid is a wonderful biocide. This means that it is very effective at killing living things like bacteria and mold. This quality makes peracetic acid a wonderful sanitizing agent.

Here's the problem. PERACETIC ACID IS VERY EFFECTIVE AT KILLING LIVING THINGS. I'm not sure I trust it in any real concentration around my kids, especially because they are wonderful at figuring out the locks on doors and cupboards. Peracetic acid has some pretty harmful side effects, which can be found by reading the MSDS.

Instead of going with an acetic acid source (vinegar), I've opted for a citric acid source: lemon juice!

Yay! I love lemon juice! Mainly as lemonade! Sometimes in tea! Yay!

The recipe that I am using, which can be found at Frugally Sustainable, is easy to prepare and yields a gallon of bleach alternative. It also didn't cost me a cent as I already had the ingredients: lemon juice, hydrogen peroxide, water, and a container.

Here's a sum-up of the steps:

1) Take a gallon-sized jug (I used an empty vinegar bottle that had been rinsed well).

2) Pour in 1.5 cups of peroxide

3) Pour in 0.5 cups of lemon juice

4) Fill the rest of the jug with water.

5) Scribble out "vinegar" on the bottle and scrawl "bleach alternative" on it instead.


I love when the authors of those other blogs make beautiful, original labels (with neat printing and scalloped edges, and nice designs) for all of their homemade things. One day I'll learn how to do that. Not today. Today, I scribble with a sharpie.

Now to test it out!
This picture is of a wash cloth that I used to scrub my sandals (more on that later).


I took this wash cloth and soaked it in a 2:1 solution of water and bleach alternative.

Here's what it looked like after soaking.


And here it is again after I popped it in the wash.


Hooray! The stains are gone! And so is some of the color! ...whoops.
Edited to add: Hey, guess what! I'm an idiot! The first two pictures show the wash cloth WET, but the third shows it DRY. This is why it looks like some of the pink had faded. I just wet it to clean up another mess, and it's dark pink again. (I'd photograph it, but it's dirty again.)

Next step: testing it in the washer.

Will it be strong enough to remove stains even when diluted? Let's find out! I'll let you know when I'm done.

Why I Am Giving Up Bleach

I grew up in a bleached world. For a while, during my adolescence, I lived with my grandmother. She was an old-school true believer in bleach. She would dilute it in a bucket and scrub down the counters, the cutting boards, the sinks, the toilets, the tubs, and the floors. As my white socks turned a grimy dark grey from my refusal to wear slippers, she would corral me and show me how to scrub them out in a tub of a strong bleach solution, then let them soak overnight until they were an acceptable shade. I thought bleach could clean everything.

I'm not denying that bleach is an excellent cleaner and sanitizer, but I really have to stop using it. You see, I have studied enough chemistry that it sort of makes me nervous.

When I use the word 'bleach' I am referring specifically to sodium hypochlorite, like what is in Clorox. (The actual definition is anything that can remove the color from something else. Technically, the sun qualifies as a bleaching agent).

Sodium hypochlorite (NaOCl) likes to react with other chemicals, including other common ones that might be in your cleaning products, including ammonia and vinegar. Unfortunately a lot of these reactions can have products that are toxic to people and pets.

1) Reacting with ammonia can produce hydrazine. HYDRAZINE IS TOXIC.
Don't believe me? Read the material safety data sheet (MSDS). Go right to section 3.

2) Reacting with vinegar or other acids can produce chlorine gas. CHLORINE GAS IS TOXIC.
Feel free to read the MSDS for this one, too.


For the longest time I have used bleach or bleach products to clean my home without a major catastrophe. What makes me so nervous now? Simple. I have two little boys. As I am doing the laundry, or cleaning the kitchen, or scrubbing the bathrooms, or mopping the floors, my sons are following me and trying to help. If there is even a little hydrazine or chlorine floating around, do I really want it in their lungs? On their skin? Stinging their curious little eyes?

No. Never.

So, I'm going bleach free. I'll let you know how it goes.