Green Brooms and Mops

Purchasing green products has been made simple by third-party certifiers. However, not all green products have an easily identifiable certification. This is true for hand tools such as broom and mops. But with a little research, one can find products with environmentally friendly attributes. First, look for brooms and mops made from sustainable materials. These include handles produced with reclaimed wood from furniture manufacturers or bamboo, a wood source that grows and renews itself faster than traditional trees. Many mops utilize PET, or PolyEthylene Therephthalate, plastics, made from recycled plastic bottles. Green hand tools also have less impact on the environment. Some mop handles feature adaptors enabling existing mop handles to be used with different mop heads. This allows users to reuse handles instead of throwing them out when they buy a different style of mop head, helping to reduce landfill waste. In addition to less waste, there is less strain on natural resources since new handles aren’t being manufactured. Microfiber mops clean with less water than cotton mops. Using microfiber can save thousands of gallons of water annually. Finally, buy from a sustainable manufacturer. To offset the production of handles, some manufacturers replant trees or protect forest and wetlands from development. Many manufacturers also allow end users to return old mops, allowing them to be recycled into new textile products.