Shortly after I came up with that homemade hand sanitizer solution with essential oils and aloe vera gel, my husband heard about electrolyzed water that is supposedly used in hospitals, food establishments, etc. for disinfecting. It's called HYPOCLOROUS ACID - it's water, salt, vinegar and THAT'S IT. I kid you not. This stuff acts like Clorox or Lysol on germs, yet because it's only made of water, salt and vinegar, it's so SAFE you can spray it straight into your eyes and mouth!
Throughout COVID I've been using hypoclorous acid on everything--in the bathrooms, kitchen, as hand sanitizer, door handles and faucets, everywhere. #1 important fact is that IT KILLS THE CORONAVIRUS. So, before and after I go into a store, I'll spray it in my mouth and up my nose--more as a safety precaution so that if anything somehow got in (through my mask), it will be killed by the solution.
I hadn't written about it until now because it just seemed hard to explain and also the price point on the home machine was pretty high. I usually like to encourage you guys to make your own shtuff, not just buy, buy, buy. But then I started thinking about how much $ this little gadget has saved me on dangerous toxic cleaners. And that's when I knew I had to blog about it.
Things to know:
Hypochlorous acid (HOCl) is a free chlorine molecule
HOCl is dominant in a chlorine solution between pH 5-6
So when you spray it around your toilet or on your hands, it does smell like chlorine. But it's not harmful to you.
How it works:
You buy the machine once, and you'll have an unlimited supply of the sanitizing solution. In fact, I regularly fill up spray bottles for all my family and friends. All I need is the Costco sized distilled white vinegar, sea salt and water! Put those 3 ingredients into the machine, plug it in, and press a button. The system will run for 3, 5 or 8 minutes depending on how concentrated you want the solution. The whole thing lights up to be a beautiful purple-ish color. After a minute or so you'll see it start bubbling. The bubbles grow to a rolling boil and then the purple light turns off and your solution is ready.
It's not a new technology, I think it's actually been around for a long time but we just never had a consumer-grade product that generated HOCl that was small enough that families could use it in their homes. It's actually such a widely accepted disinfectant that there are federal, state, food industry and local health regulations that require HOCl to be at a pH of 5-6.
There are other brands of this machine out there. But the two things I love about this one in particular is that:
You don't have to buy anything else except salt and vinegar to keep producing the solution. Other brands/types of machines I've heard of you have to buy these pods and use 1 every time you make the solution. That's how they make $$$ off you.
With this machine, they also give you a little bottle of Potassium Carbonate and instructions for how to use the same machine to make a DEGREASER. And honey, this degreaser is AMAZING. I use it on our eating counter after dinner. I use it on the stovetop after I've just fried something and there's oil splattered everywhere. I use it to clean the inside of my OVEN! That's how strong and effective it is on grease! I literally can spray it all over my oven, wait a few seconds, and wipe clean with a paper towel. All the caked on grease comes right off. So gratifying! And without the need to use carcinogen-packed commercial oven cleaners.
Ok so the brand we got is EcoloxTech. Here's the link to their website to get it.
I promise you won't regret it.