5 Cleaning Hacks that Preserve Water, Energy, and Your Stuff

May 24, 2021 at 09:15 AM EDT

Quick and easy changes to your cleaning habits can save you money and help the planet.

Since the pandemic—and doing more of everything at home—it probably feels like you’re cleaning more, too. You might be wondering how to strike a balance between keeping clean or keeping "green."

A new study by P&G found that 71% of people want to do more to be sustainable at home, but fewer than four in 10 make environmentally conscious choices at home as often as they’d like. For most people, “not knowing how” is one of the top barriers to acting sustainably.

“It may surprise you to know many cleaning products are designed to work better using less product, energy, and water,” says Morgan Brashear, Senior Scientist for P&G. “How we use them makes all the difference.”

Here are five easy cleaning hacks to help with your personal footprint.

Save the equivalent of 80,000 glasses of water a year just by using the dishwasher

It’s as easy as skipping the prewash and going right to the dishwasher. Highly effective dish cleaners like Cascade are scientifically-designed to clean stuck-on food without pre-rinsing.

A running sink can use up to 4 gallons of water every two minutes, while an ENERGY STAR certified dishwasher uses less than 4 gallons per cycle. Using your dishwasher daily instead of washing by hand can save up to 100 gallons of water a week.
Let your dishwasher pay for itself in energy and water cost savings

Did you know that a dishwasher uses half* of the energy that handwashing does? According to ENERGY STAR, you can save up to $130 per year** on utility bills just by using your dishwasher.

Over the lifetime of the dishwasher, that’s potentially thousands of dollars in savings.
Use cleaners that extend the life of your things

With a simple wet, squeeze, and erase, the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser can extend the life of products all over your house. Whether it’s keeping rust from building up on your kitchen appliances, cutting through soap scum and hard water spots on your bathtub and shower glass, or even making sure your white tennis shoes stay pristinely white, the Magic Eraser can keep your stuff looking like new.

“It’s based in science, but the Magic Eraser truly is magical,” says Brashear. “Although it’s best known for removing scuffs and marks from walls, the Magic Eraser’s applications extend throughout the entire home. And the best part is, all you need is a little water to activate the magic.”

Meanwhile, Febreze odor-eliminating fabric sprays can extend the life of fabric furniture by reducing odors that build up over time, or extend the wearability of clothes between washes. So instead of replacing your couch pillows every couple of years, you can keep them smelling like new with a little spritz.
Look for concentrated formulas to reduce water usage

You may instinctively avoid products that say “concentrated” from what you know about food labels, but cleaning products are different. Quality dish cleaners are scientifically formulated to get the job done the first time so you can tackle more dishes with less dishwashing liquid and less water.

New innovations are wasting less water, too. Winner of the Good Housekeeping 2020 Best Cleaning Product Awards, Dawn Powerwash creates spray-activated suds without water to get dishes clean without soaking, so there’s no need to use the faucet until the final rinse.
Skip scrubbing and save nearly 10 days’ worth of personal time each year

If you’re willing to give up the sponge and your handwash habit, you can save 30 minutes by simply using the dishwasher. That means over the course of a year, you can save nearly 10 days of personal time. That’s enough time savings to start your own compost pile and garden.

Following these simple tips can bring more green into your cleaning routine. For more on saving water at home and finding products to help, visit https://cascadeclean.com/en-us/about-cascade/rethink-the-sink/.

About Procter & Gamble

P&G serves consumers around the world with one of the strongest portfolios of trusted, quality, leadership brands, including Always®, Ambi Pur®, Ariel®, Bounty®, Charmin®, Crest®, Dawn®, Downy®, Fairy®, Febreze®, Gain®, Gillette®, Head & Shoulders®, Lenor®, Olay®, Oral-B®, Pampers®, Pantene®, SK-II®, Tide®, Vicks®, and Whisper®. The P&G community includes operations in approximately 70 countries worldwide. Please visit https://www.pg.com/ for the latest news and information about P&G and its brands. For other P&G news, visit us at www.pg.com/news.

*When using dishwasher four times a week versus handwashing for 17 minutes every day.

**When switching from using 180 gallons of water per week handwashing to automatic dishwashing 4 times a week, electricity rate of 11c/kWh (US).