Sierra Club Embraces Clorox. No, Really

An unlikely ménage à trois between Clorox, a green cleaning company and the Sierra Club will soon be taking place in America's heartland grocery stores.

Clorox has been buying up companies with green credibility, most notably Burt's Bees. Its latest acquisition is Green Works, and the Sierra Club has endorsed the product line in a big way, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Why are these odd bedfellows? Clorox is synonymous with bleach, and this is how the Environmental Protection Agency describes chlorine on its Website for kids:

"Did you know that a pesticide is added to your washing machine to help keep your white clothes white? This pesticide is also found in many household cleaning products that contain a 'disinfectant' to kill germs. And it is found in household products used to clean mold and mildew from your shower or tub. Can you guess what this pesticide is? Chlorine Bleach!"

Chlorine is useful, even life-saving, as a disinfectant in public water treatment systems. But it can produce potentially harmful byproducts, and it is also used in the manufacturing of some pretty nasty stuff: chlorinated solvents, polyvinyl chloride (PVC) resins and chlorofluorocarbons among them. Chlorine manufacturing plants also produce mercury, a potent brain toxin that is released into the air, rains down and ultimately contaminates the fish we eat. The Sierra Club has joined lawsuits seeking to clean up chlorine plants for this reason.

Chlorine, then, is not so green. But Green Works is.

Here's how the Green Works brand describes itself:

"Green Works is at least 99 percent natural and made from ingredients derived from coconuts and lemon oil. The products are formulated to be biodegradable, non-allergenic, packaged in bottles that can be recycled and not tested on animals. The Green Works line includes five household cleaning products: an all-purpose cleaner, a glass cleaner, a toilet bowl cleaner, a dilutable cleaner, and a bathroom cleaner."

The benign cleaning product line right now can be hard to find. Sierra Club supports Clorox's acquisition (the environmental group's logo will appear on packaging) because it will give nontoxic alternatives to a bigger slice of the American public. Green alternatives aren't always easy to come by in Middle America's Wal-Marts. With the Clorox corporate relationships, brand recognition and marketing muscle, that should change.

The Daily Green always likes to see companies take green steps, especially if it helps increase the options for consumers who want to go green.

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