Category: Facilities Management

It’s never been so important to keep places hygienically clean by killing bacteria and viruses, including the Coronavirus, while also reducing pollutants and the huge amounts of waste plastic in our oceans and landfill.

When combined with the fact that long-term use of cleaning chemicals can have a serious impact on your health, this means we need to think differently about how cleaning can reduce our impact on the planet. Quite literally, we need to clean up our act.

Here, we explain what makes Toucan Eco sustainable. But before we do this, let’s understand the basics.

What is Toucan Eco?

Toucan Eco puts the power of electrolysed water at your fingertips. No chemicals, no single-use plastic bottles. Just a proven, effective way to wipe out germs without harming the environment.

Using a process of electrolysis, it transforms tap water and table salt – both natural and sustainable resources – into a disinfectant cleaner that kills more than 99.99% of germs and replaces 80% of chemical cleaners and the single use plastic bottles they’re supplied in.

It’s completely safe to use as it’s based on the same infection fighting hypochlorous acid that our own immune systems produce, which makes it non-toxic and hypoallergenic.

So, let’s run through the key points that put the ‘eco’ in Toucan Eco.

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Does it reduce single-use plastic waste?

Yes, it does, and that’s why it’s great for supporting single-use plastic reduction initiatives.

You no longer need to buy 80% or more of your chemical cleaners, which are most commonly supplied in single-use plastic bottles. Plus, concentrated chemical bottles are mostly made from virgin plastic too, and many of these can’t be recycled as they contain toxic ingredients. With around 30% of all plastic being recycled in the UK, according to the British Plastics Initiative, the majority will still end up in landfill.

By switching to Toucan Eco, for every typical one litre plastic bottle you’re saving over two litres of water, 4 million joules of energy, and a quarter of a litre of oil. And, for every ton of plastic, you’re saving about three tons of CO2.

Does it reduce chemical use and their side effects?

It’s well known that chemicals can be harmful to the environment. For example, some aerosols damage the ozone layer and cleaning chemicals carry health warnings as they can cause allergic reactions such as coughing and skin irritation or dermatitis.

Recent studies have found that regular exposure to cleaning products may significantly affect lung function and suggest that the chemicals in cleaning products irritate the mucous membranes that line the airways of the lungs, causing long-term damage. In a long-term study, the effects were also found to be more severe among women than men.

Toucan Eco doesn’t contain any of these synthetic ingredients – so no phthalates, ammonia, additives, or fragrances. 99.99% of the solution is water, and the pH (a measure of acidity and alkalinity) of the solution is around a gentle 7.8 to 8.5. This means it’s mildly alkaline but not aggressive like common bleach, which has a pH of 10 and above. As it’s safe, you don’t need protective clothing.

Can it contribute to making our buildings green?

The World Green Building Council talks about how we can make our buildings greener through a combination of factors such as minimising energy use with renewable and low carbon technologies, reducing water consumption, minimising waste, maximising reuse, and recycling anything left – of which Toucan Eco can contribute effectively to achieving.

We can also promote health and wellbeing with improved air quality, while avoiding chemicals that create harmful or toxic emissions.

Can Toucan Eco contribute to WELL or BREEAM-rated buildings?

The simple answer is yes. We spend over 90% of our lives in and around buildings. And these buildings can trap pollutants – such as spray cleaners and VOCs – in the air which then circulates within the building. If there’s little or no ventilation these pollutants will remain within the building for some time.

So, the more we can do to remove the use of airborne pollutants – replacing synthetic chemical cleaners with systems such as Toucan Eco – the better the air quality and the healthier the environment.

As well as pollution, Toucan Eco also neatly aligns with BREEAM’s and WELL’s focus on sustainability in a building’s energy use, waste, transportation, carbon emissions, and healthy attributes.

Does Toucan Eco reduce transportation?

Yes, as the solution is made on demand where it’s used there’s no need to transport the solution from place of manufacture to place of use. And once on-site, as it only uses water and salt, the carbon footprint of generating the combined the solution is minimal.

And while electrolysing, the models do not generate any hazardous gases, and the amount of electricity used to generate a litre of the solution is around 10th of that used to boil a kettle so energy consumption if very low.

Is the solution safe to dispose of?

Yes, it’s safe to pour down drains and reverts to slightly salty water. Or you can pour it into the device and reactivate. 

Summing up the parts

Toucan Eco has minimal environmental impact and reduces the use of harmful chemicals and the single-use plastic bottles they are supplied in. There’s also the reduction in energy, oil and carbon needed to make the solution when compared with synthetic chemicals. This means it helps to reduce your carbon footprint and supports plastic waste initiatives.

It doesn’t harm building air quality that cleaners, or customers, work in, live in, or visit, and there’s no need for protective equipment as the solution is non-toxic, and hypoallergenic.

It’s not tested on animals and is vegan-friendly. Once used, the solution reverts to slightly salty water, and can be safely disposed of without any environmental impact.

That’s why it’s revolutionary in the way that it is eco-friendly – and another step towards reducing the amount of toxic chemicals through concentrates, tablet form or alternative ingredients which can still be harmful.