‘Magic Water’ Can Clean Toilets, But Is Still Drinkable

Electrolyzed water is just ionized salt water - but it has stronger cleaning power than bleach, while remaining clean and drinkable.

By Kathryn Hawkins. Posted on March 04 2010

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It cleans toilets. It disinfects raw meat. It sanitizes sweaty gym equipment and grungy sinks. Oh, and by the way—you can drink it, too.

Sound dubious? We thought so too—until we discovered that the secret ingredients in this miracle cleaner/disinfectant consist of water and salt. No bleach, no toxic trisyllabic chemicals—just clean, all-natural elements that you can feel confident taking a swig of anytime.

Even though saltwater doesn’t normally match the cleaning power of a bottle of Lysol, the ions in this water are scrambled with an electric current. The result, known as electrolyzed water, is strong enough to kill spores of anthrax, but still safe enough to drink.

The cleaner has been used in countries like Russia and Japan for decades, but it’s just beginning to pick up steam here in the United States. While electrolyzing machines are probably a bit pricey for home use, costing around $10,000, businesses are starting to stock up on the miracle cleaning solution. At a Los Angeles hotel, the housekeepers have traded in their abrasive cleaning solutions for bottles of the substance, and are amazed by the results.

“I didn’t believe in it at first because it didn’t have foam or any scent,” housekeeper Flor Corona told the Los Angeles Times. “But I can tell you it works. My rooms are clean.”

Electrolyzed water has also proven to be remarkably effective in eliminating contaminants from food products, which could go a long way towards ridding food-borne bacteria like e. coli from our restaurants and grocery stores.

“It’s 10 times more effective than bleach in killing bacteria,” Yen-Con Hung, a professor of food science at University of Georgia-Griffin, said. We’ve got a feeling it tastes a lot better too—not that we’d want to put it to the test.

Filed under: General Interest, Green, Science,

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