Month: April 2019

In which Dillie The Lazy Cow (DK1) has a tricky conversation with Dillie The Annoying Goody-Goody (DK2)

DK1 FFS. Who’s idea was it to put this in?

DK2 Yours!

DK1 Mine? You mean yours?

DK2 Okay, mine. Whaddevah… Anyway, as I was saying, about batteries…

DK1Wot! Not content with taking away my luxury toilet paper and banning me from using shower gel, you’re telling me I can’t use batteries now?

DK2 Just listen for a minute, would you!

DK1 But I neeeeeed batteries! I use lots of them! They are essential to my life!

DK2 I know. The TV remote, your mouse, the smoke alarm, toys, the car, the golf buggy, your vibrator, etc. etc.

DK1 Yeah yeah yeah. So?

DK2 Do you recycle them?

DK1 Um, sometimes… Why?

DK2 Because batteries contain many toxic chemicals and heavy metals. These can include lead, antimony, calcium, cobalt, tin, selenium, nickel, cadmium… etc. Cobalt is particularly pernicious as although it’s associated with the transition to cleaner energy, it also has a history of child exploitation and human rights abuses in the Congo.

DK1 Nasty. But what has that to do with recycling?

DK2 If you blithely chuck out dead batteries with the rubbish, those poisons go to the tip or landfill. The casing of the battery corrodes and the contents, sulphuric acid and lithium and lead for example, leach out into the groundwater and into the food chain. If those tasty morsels got into your body, you might glow in the dark.

DK1 I’m an actress, I can think of nothing more FAAAABULOUS than being my own spotlight! Give me a real reason to worry.

DK2 How about fish and chips and potassium carbonate for your dinner?

DK1 Ok, not so nice. I can see I’ll have to go vegetarian.

DK2 Are you sure? The impurities in the water are absorbed by plants and fruit and then you eat the plants. In other words, mercury soup and aluminium apple sauce. Either way, they get into your body. Not great for the digestion. Or the kidney, the liver, the skin, or your asthma. Or your children. Not even fruitarians escape.

DK1 Golly. Would my water taste different too?

DK2 Many of those toxins don’t actually have a lot of taste – so they can sneak into your whiskey and water and not be noticed.

DK1 Nobody could accuse you of optimism, could they?

DK2 You may mock, but there’s more. Primary lithium batteries ignite very easily. Imagine the number of lithium batteries being crushed by heavy machinery in landfill sites. One exposed battery catches light and whoosh! You’ve got a fire that “can burn for years underground.” Here in the UK, fire and rescue services have to deal with approximately 300 significant fires in waste dumps every year, and a significant number of those are started by lithium batteries. Think of that toxic air… incredibly toxic. Nice.

DK2 Scientists reckon if “an irreversible thermal event” occurs in Lithium-ion batteries, it may release perhaps 100 different gases if they do combust. “An irreversible thermal event” – it’s a chilling phrase, isn’t it?

DK1 Blimey.

DK2 Blimey is right. So are you going to recycle ALL your batteries now?

DK1 Yes, all right, all right. Don’t go on.

DK2 And will you switch things off when you’re not using them to conserve battery life?

DK1 Yes, yes, yes, okaaaaay!

DK2 And what about that natty little cook’s timer that doesn’t have an off switch?

DK1 I take the battery out when I’m not using it to make it last longer.

DK2 Good girl.

DK1 Don’t patronise me, bi-atch…

DK2 Wouldn’t dream of it. By the way, did you know that serious injuries and deaths caused by swallowing batteries is on the increase in a big way?

DK1 Tsk. Who swallows a battery?

DK2 Little kids with little fingers taking little button batteries out of toys. Granny’s arthritic fingers drop the tiny hearing aid batteries…

DK2 Toddlers and crawlers love little shiny things! It’s even been reported in the Daily Mail!

DK1 Gosh, it must be true then!!! But surely Science is moving on?

DK2 Not fast enough to sort the mounting battery problem.

DK1 So what’s the solution?

DK2 Buy better batteries. Cheap batteries run down quickly – spend more on them and they last longer. Rechargeable whenever possible. And always always ALWAYS recycle.

DK1 Where?

DK2 Doh… At the supermarket in the UK! Or the toxic waste station in the USA. Doesn’t matter where you are – just type “BATTERY RECYCLING” into Google with your postcode or address, and your search engine will tell you where your nearest recycling point is.

DK1 So this piece should really be called ‘Batteries in the garbage’?

DK2 Have it your way.

WHAT YOU WILL SAVE

The planet.

And finally, by public demand…

Before you go…

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We all love helium balloons, don’t we? Pretty floaty things that cheaply cheer up a dreary event room for hire… Personalise them and someone will feel a little warmer around the heart – Happy 80^th Birthday Grandad! Dennis and Dave’s Wedding! Poppa’s Little Princess! Give your loved one a heart shaped balloon for Valentine’s Day… awww….

And then, when we’ve had a few glasses of wine, there’s the added fun of undoing the balloon and breathing in the helium, and speaking in a weird high voice for a few sentences. We’ve all done it, it’s ridiculous and very very funny.

Except I now feel a little bit guilty about that innocent bit of fun, because now I know that helium is an incredibly rare and marvellous gas and maybe I shouldn’t be using it so flippantly.

Helium… hmmm… this is one of those subjects that makes me wish I’d paid more attention to my science lessons in school.  But I was a giddy musical geek who gave science up as soon as I possibly could. So bear with me.

Eek, it’s getting a bit sciency!!!

Helium is one of six noble gases. The noble gases are all called noble because they are incredibly stable, and helium wins first prize as being the most chemically inert element yet discovered. It won’t blow up or become corrupted with other gases. If helium were a person, it would be the Dalai Llama:  stable, adaptable, brilliant, admirable, noble, but unrepeatable when it’s gone. (That’s entirely my flight of fancy – please don’t tell any scientists you’ve met. And if you’re a scientist, pretend you haven’t read it.)

It’s also the second lightest of the gases. Hydrogen is lighter, but you wouldn’t want hydrogen balloons at your party. Students of 20th Century history will know of the terrible tragedy of the Hindenburg, the German passenger airship that blew up in 1937, killing 36. The jury’s still out on what actually started the fire, but certainly the hydrogen used to lift the dirigible was highly flammable.

Strangely, in spite of being the second most abundant gas in the universe, here on planet earth, helium is one of the world’s rarest elements, making up about 0.0005% of the earth’s atmosphere. It’s harvested from underground, from fields of other gases as a by-product of those gases.

Helium’s lightness is its downfall – or perhaps I should say, it’s upfall – because the minute it hits the surface of the earth it vamooses into outer space.  Gravity has no effect on it.  Whoosh, and it’s gone.  That’s why it’s so brilliant for party balloons. 

It’s put to better use in MRI scanners, where it acts as a coolant for the superconducting magnets that produce those astonishing images of your insides, and which have become such vital diagnostic tools.

It’s a key component of the tanks that deep-sea divers wear – mixing it with oxygen helps prevent them getting “the bends”.  Without it, the Large Hadron Collider wouldn’t exist. Not only that, I’ve had to end my dreams of making my fortune smuggling radioactive materials because I’ve discovered that Helium-3 can aid in detecting neutrons from a long distance. It really is the most miraculous stuff.  

Since helium is so scarce and non-renewable, scientists and manufacturers are very keen that we don’t waste it.  Only 14 plants around the world produce helium for sale, in the following countries (and in order of quantity produced) – USA, Qatar, Algeria, Russia, Poland and Australia  Some of those plants only produce tiny amounts.

The USA did have huge quantities which had been stockpiled in the Federal Helium Reserve, but the stocks outstripped the demand for so long that in 1996, the US Government decided to get rid of its surplus, and cheaply.

However, as more and more uses have been found for this wonder gas, it’s become more expensive.  From 2007 to 2017, the price went up by 250%.

Crisis

In July 2017, the blockade of Qatar by a large group of other Arab countries meant the second largest supplier of helium was suddenly unable to sell or shift it out of the country. The blockade continues.

If that can happen, one can assume that those few other sources might not be much more reliable.  Algeria is hardly a model state. We live in an age of political instability. In August 2017, the EU was so concerned about stocks of this vital element that it added helium’s name to the list of Critical Raw Materials.  And who’d have thought that the President of the United States might threaten trade wars all over the place?  

This is all in spite of the fact that a huge reserve of helium was discovered in the Rift Valley, Tanzania in 2016.  You’d think people in the know would have been rejoicing and dancing in the street, but they’re still worried.  Supplies have not yet come on stream, and the price of helium rose 10% in the month after the find.  

Sadly, Tanzania is bedeviled by corruption and political instability.  The democracy established in 1994 that made the country so attractive to international investors for thirty years has proved tragically fragile, and the current president, John Magufuli, has rapidly transformed the country into a dictatorship of the usual depressing brutality.  You know the kind of thing – corruption, people disappearing, mutilated bodies turning up on beaches.

Okay, the quantity of helium found in the Rift Valley is very considerable, and it gives the world a great big breathing space (in a funny high voice).   But more and more uses are being found for the gas.  Yes, there will be more helium deposits found.  Higher prices of the gas will encourage more gas fields to harvest it from ever tinier deposits instead of letting it escape into the atmosphere as happens now.  Labs are finding ways to recycle it, and there is always the prospect of mining for it on the moon. 

But wouldn’t it be a bitter irony if we couldn’t have a vital MRI scan in 20 years time because we’d squandered so much of this marvellous stuff on party balloons?

What you will save

It depends if you’re planning Macy’s parade or having a party for three-year olds.  Hobbycraft online offer a Helium Balloon bundle for £28.  For that you get a helium canister, 10 white latex, 10 neon and 10 assorted balloons,  a packet of Unique Party Iridescent Curling Ribbon, and 6 Black Foil Balloon Weights.  No information is given about what to do with the empty canister, the iridescent curling ribbon and the foil weights… hmmm…

P.S.

Helium balloons come in three types.  Foil (known in the US as Mylar), latex and Macy’s parade.  The foil balloons are nasty little bastards, and have caused an enormous number of serious power cuts (or in the current rather ugly language, power outages).  It’s cos they float away, innit, and when they come into contact with power lines, they can cause a power surge or a short circuit.   Result – fires, melted electrical wires, power cuts, possible injuries, damage to properties, and enormous inconvenience all round.

If and when they bypass the power lines, they just float on up and up and up, expanding as they go. At about 7,000 feet, they often explode, or float into the countryside. Death Valley is apparently littered with thousands of spent party balloons. Lovely. Especially as they’re not biodegradable. So many reasons not to buy the little buggers. 

P.P.S.

I can’t leave without mentioning Lawn Chair Larry, the Californian daredevil who strapped a load of helium-filled weather balloons to an aluminium garden chair and shot up to 16,000 feet, drifted into LAX airport airspace, and finally came to earth on Long Beach having done a ton of damage to some power lines en route? Here he is, lifting off…

Just in case you’re tempted to do the same thing, the notoriety destroyed him. He seems to have only had sporadic employment, and finally shot himself through the heart in Angeles National Forest. 

Ooh, the things I have found out since starting this blog…! I dragged that photo (sorry, but at least I’m fessing up) from a website called findagrave.com. It was uploaded by Scott Michaels, I’m presuming he was the photographer and I’ve written him a nice email to tell him I’ve used his snap and I’ll pay him if necessary. What interesting hobbies some people do have!

Are you planning to eat your underpants? Suck your jeans? Bandage a nasty cut with your freshly washed sweater? 

No? Then you do not need Dettol® Antibacterial Laundry Cleanser. 

This is the ultimate three-card trick of the laundry world, the cleverest, most pernicious con-job I’ve seen in a long time. Talk about inventing something completely unnecessary…

I am racking my brains to think why you might need hygienic clothing. 

Are you working in a research lab under the strictest of conditions? In which case, the lab will have its own routines, procedures and special clothing that keep the lab sterile. Same with a hospital. 

Are you looking after someone ill? You still don’t need antibacterial laundry cleanser because believe me, if the patient is THAT sick that they need totally sterile conditions, they won’t be at home under your care, they’ll be in an Intensive Care Unit.

Do you work with livestock? Have you just chucked up all over a favourite blouse? In which case, soaking the soiled articles in a bucket overnight, rinsing and then washing in a modern machine with modern detergent should do the trick. Repeat the process if there’s still a whiff or a stain. 

Look, clean clothing is nice. We all enjoy putting on a crisp, freshly laundered shirt. But it’s a shirt. It’s not dinner. It’s not a bandage. It doesn’t need to be hygienic. 

The power of three

Dettol® are really onto a winner here, because this product is being sold as a third component of your wash. Yes, they advise you to use it IN ADDITION to detergent AND fabric conditioner. (I assure you, there’ll be a piece here on fabric conditioner later, fret not.) 

Here are the ingredients. I don’t pretend to understand them individually, all I know is that they are yet more ENTIRELY unnecessary chemicals being put into the poor overloaded sewage system.

Per 100 g Liquid, contains 1.44 g Quaternary Ammonium Compounds, Di-C8- 10- Alkyldimethyl, Chlorides and 0.96 g Quaternary Ammonium Compounds, Benzyl-C12-18-Alkyldimethyl, Chlorides, Contains 5% Non-Ionic Surfactants, Disinfectant, Perfume, Butyl Phenyl Methyl Propional, Hexyl Cinnamal and Citronellol.

That’s a lot of chemicals to get out of the system to make our tap water drinkable. Even if you insist on drinking bottled water (and I most sincerely hope you don’t), it’s nice to know you have potable water to make your tea and boil your vegetables in.

New products make waves

As far as I am aware, this is a new product on the market. I haven’t yet discovered any other anti-bloody-bacterial bloody laundry bloody cleansers for sale. (Let me know if I’m wrong – I can always edit!) But I have a ghastly feeling that now this has come on sale, the suits in the other detergent/cleanser companies will be cacking themselves in fright because Dettol® have stolen a march on them.

“Say, Chuck! Have you seen this new product, Dettol® Antibacterial Laundry Cleanser?”

“OMG, Sir, I just saw the cutesie-cutesie ad on TV last night for the first time and I shat my pants, it was such a great idea!”

“Yes siree, bob, and it’s for moments like that that we NEED to be selling an Antibacterial Laundry Cleanser of our own!”

“Don’t worry, Sir, I’ve authorised the Research and Development Team to get working on our own product!”

“Good man. We’ll strike the fear of laundry-related disease into the public.”

Fear sells

This product is a perfect example of Steve Jobs’ theory that we, the public, don’t know what we want until we see it in all its glory.

There are various marketing strategies that companies use, but the cleverest inspire either Lust or Fear. The iPhone was such a glorious piece of technology it made us weak with lust. On the other hand, this new laundry product reminds us that we are scared rigid about bacteria and socially terrified of being smelly. 

Here’s some of the blurb from the Sainsbury’s website. 

“Dettol Laundry Cleanser is an additive that kills 99.9% of bacteria giving odour-free freshness : 1. Kills 99.9% of bacteria, even below 20ºC so that you can be confident that your laundry is hygienically clean every time, whatever temperature you wash at (proven to work in rinse cycle temperatures as low as 15ºC) 2. Gives odour-free freshness for up to 12 hours. It doesn’t just cover up malodour but eliminates odour causing bacteria at source….”

“Ideal for towels, children’s clothes, underwear, socks, bedding …and more…”

To kill viruses**
Soaking: add 1 cap to 2.5L of water and leave to soak for 15 mins
**Laboratory tested on influenza H1 N1; RSV; Coronavirus; Herpes Simplex Type

Note the various fear-triggering words in there…

• bacteria
• odour
• malodour
• children
• viruses
• influenza
• herpes

…all designed to make you worried about something you NEVER thought of before – the fact that your laundry might emerge from the wash like creatures from the deep… contaminated and riddled with viruses!

Listen. You get your clothes out of the washing machine and dry them – tumble drier, washing line, heated towel rail – it doesn’t matter which. During the drying process they will come into contact with the air which is full of all sorts of microscopic bugs that we can do NOTHING about and which mainly do us NO harm. 

Maybe a fly lands on your t-shirt while it’s drying. Are you going to wash it again? Don’t be daft. 

You pop your knickers on and, whoopsie doo! A wee fart escapes. Are you going to wash them again? I no nink no. 

You do your trousers up and the dog jumps up to say hello. Are you going to put them back in the machine immediately? Don’t be ridiculous.

And if you’re not completely convinced, here’s this from the product description. 

Causes serious eye damage.

Ah. That’s not so good. Here’s another.

Harmful to aquatic life with long lasting effects.

We are washing this stuff into the sewage system???

Oh, and there’s yet another empty plastic bottle at the end of it which is going to go… er… where?  Landfill, of course!!!!

Time was when Dettol® was a comforting product. Mum always had a bottle under the sink so that if a kid got sick on the bathroom floor, or the cat pooped in the kitchen, she’d clear it up, mop the floor and then go over it with a bit of Dettol®. She dabbed cuts and grazes with it too. The smell was clean and hospitally and safe. That’s not so surprising, as it started its life in hospitals where it was used in surgical procedures to clean cuts, wounds etc.

Now, it’s owned by Reckitt Benckiser, a British multinational consumer goods company, and it’s just another brand trying to make a buck in an increasingly crowded and competitive marketplace. Long term responsibility towards the planet doesn’t figure in the world of retail sales, I guess. Shame on them.

YOU DO NOT NEED HYGIENIC CLOTHING. I REPEAT, AND I MAKE NO APOLOGY FOR SHOUTING, YOU DO NOT NEED HYGIENIC CLOTHING. YOU DO NOT NEED THIS PRODUCT!!!

COVID UPDATE

I hadn’t bargained with a worldwide pandemic when I wrote this last year. A couple of folk have contacted me to say that in the light of Covid-19, Antibacterial laundry IS necessary after all – but I’m relieved to say this is not the case. I’ve checked with various NHS websites and this is from the government website.

Wash items in accordance with the manufacturer’s instructions. Use the warmest water setting and dry items completely. Dirty laundry that has been in contact with an unwell person can be washed with other people’s items.

Do not shake dirty laundry, this minimises the possibility of dispersing virus through the air.

Clean and disinfect anything used for transporting laundry with your usual products, in line with the cleaning guidance above.

ANOTHER UPDATE 13.09.21

This came from Healthline which is a pretty reputable site. “The stability of SARS-CoV-2 on cloth was also tested in the Lancet articleTrusted Source mentioned earlier. It was found that viable virus couldn’t be recovered from cloth after 2 days. Generally speaking, it’s probably not necessary to wash your clothes after every time you go out. However, if you’ve been unable to maintain proper physical distance from others, or if someone has coughed or sneezed near you, it’s a good idea to wash your clothes.

A study in Emerging Infectious Diseases assessed which surfaces in a hospital were positive for SARS-CoV-2. A high number of positives were found from floor samples. Half of the samples from the shoes of ICU workers also tested positive.

It’s unknown how long SARS-CoV-2 can survive on floors and shoes. If you’re concerned about this, consider removing your shoes at your front door as soon as you get home. You can also wipe the soles of your shoes with a disinfecting wipe after going out.”

IN CONCLUSION – unless you need to use clothing or linen again that day, there is no need for this pernicious stuff.

Finally, a word from Miss P.