Environmentally friendly vapor steam cleaner relies on nanotechnology
One of the more promising cleaning innovations to hit the US consumer market in recent years is the vapor steam cleaner. Using only tap water, these clever devices disinfect, clean, and deodorize all in one simple process.
Typical buyers are allergy or asthma sufferers, as well as anyone who is germ-phobic. The very hot, low-water-content steam that the machines emit can kill dust mites, viruses, bacteria, molds, and fungi, and do it all without chemicals, which themselves cause allergic reactions in some people.
The better steam cleaners come with attachments that allow you to clean everything from kitchen floors to heating vents to carpets to clothes.
But buying a steam cleaner is no simple matter. You can pay less than $100 for a small machine up to several thousand dollars for a large, multipurpose device.
“I would approach it by educating myself first,” says Mercia Tapping, founder of the Waltham-based website AllergyBuyersClub.com and an allergy sufferer herself. “There is a big amount of difference between the least expensive steam cleaner and the top of the line.”
Steve Hanson, cofounder of TheJanitorialStore.com, a Brainerd, Minn., firm that sells products to cleaning companies, says: “The best advice is to match the machine to your needs.”
Tapping says before you start shopping, you should understand how steam cleaners work.
First, they boil water in a tank. Then, when you pull or press a trigger, steam comes out and sanitizes whatever you are trying to clean. The steam then rises into the machine and is trapped in a towel that is attached to the device.
“They look like vacuum cleaners, but they don’t vacuum anything up,” Tapping says. “They use heat to draw it out.”
The better and more expensive steam cleaners make the water hotter, and some newer ones have a patented technology that actually changes the molecular structure of water, according to Tapping.
“It’s called TANCS, which is an EPA-registered disinfectant. It uses nanotechnology,” she says. “It’s more effective than chemical disinfectants.”
Source: boston.com
July 11th, 2008 at 9:52 pm
You are so right, there have been a lot of new products to hit the market in recent years—but none have caught my attention more than these fantastic vapor steam cleaners. I sort of backed into them by accident while searching on the Web for ways to sanitize without using chemicals. I happened on an Epinions article called “Vapor Steam Cleaners: Knowing What You Are Getting and Where It Came From” which referenced a couple of other articles—and I instantly had to know all there was to know. There was a great guy at 1-800-GO-VAPOR that was terribly helpful. I ordered the one with continuous flow—and could not be happier. I hope others will look into these wonderful green machines and help protect our planet and our health by cleaning with vapor and throwing our chemicals away.