Spring cleaning without the headache.

• Author: Pennybacker, Mindy
• Position: Green Guidance

It's springtime, when some dream of love and others of cleaning house. In both cases, it can be a challenge to find the real thing. Conventional cleaning products, rather than producing pristine homes as advertisements claim, actually leave indoor air polluted with a toxic smog of petrochemical volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and the synthetic fragrances used to mask them. Fumes emitted by everyday household products such as cleansers, cosmetics, and paint are "the same stuff that comes out of a tailpipe or a smokestack," a spokesman for the California Air Resources Board told the Los Angeles Times last spring. Indeed, household products are the second greatest source of outdoor air pollution in the Los Angeles region. Indoors, levels of pollutants can be from two to more than 100 times higher than outside, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Think, then, what damage VOCs in cleaning products, used on a regular basis year-round, can do in the enclosed space of a home, where they can build up for months. "When they evaporate, they are transported directly to the brain, where they can be as intoxicating as ether or chloroform. These are palpably dangerous to health," said Kaye Kilburn, professor of internal medicine at the University of Southern California medical school. In other words, when someone complains of being knocked out after cleaning house, it's likely not just a turn of phrase. Cleaning-product VOCs, many of which are neurotoxins and known or suspected carcinogens and/or hormone disruptors, have been implicated in headaches, dizziness, watery eyes, skin rashes, and respiratory problems. A Spanish study published in November 2003 surveyed over 4,000 women and found that 25 percent of asthma cases in the group were attributable to domestic cleaning work.

This spring, give your house a break. Open windows to let in fresh air, and use nontoxic cleaners. Below are some ingredients to avoid in cleaning products, and some safer, simpler alternatives.

Detergents for dishes, laundry, floors, countertops: Most conventional soaps are made from petroleum, a nonrenewable resource. Some contain alkyphenol ethoxylates (APEs), suspected hormone disruptors that can threaten wildlife after they go down the drain. Inhalation of vapors from butyl cellosolve, used as a solvent to dissolve grease, may irritate the respiratory tract and cause nausea, headaches, dizziness, and unconsciousness. Finally, like an overly perfumed loved...