No. 34-1 (December 2011)

●JSDA participated in the 7th WCD held from Oct. 2 to 9, 2010 in Montreux, Switzerland.

The theme was "Sustainability" and "Mottainai".

892 people from 57 countries attended, 40 companies or more provided the exhibition booth, and various oral presentations were given during the session. On Oct. 5 and 6, CEOs of P&G, Unilever and Henkel, global detergent manufacturers, gave keynote addresses about each company's long-term strategy on sustainability which was made based on the global trend analysis of the industry.

JSDA also provided a poster in the exhibition booth of INCPA (International Network of Cleaning Products Association), which was jointly prepared with the associations of EU, US, Australia, Canada and Brazil. Oral presentation session took place on Oct. 6 under a theme of "Mottainai". In the session, JSDA gave a presentation - "Laundry Habits/Practice, Product Development and Approach to Environmental Issues in Japan".

Interest shown in the exhibition booth

Major interest was drawn in the poster exhibition, which included the survey result of laundry habits/practice conducted by JSDA and achievement of the 3R action plan voluntarily developed by JSDA.
　　
In addition, there were a lot of discussions on the global price increase of fat and oil raw materials and increased demand of surfactant during the session. In relation to them, many questions were given regarding the detergent market in Japan and data concerning the demand.

● Living drainage

Industrial drain was considered as primary cause of water pollution in the past. Nowadays, 70% of organic pollutant in Japan comes from living drainage discharged from ordinary household as a result of advancement of industrial drain management. It should be importantly noted that contained in living drainage is not only detergent, while it is true that living drainage pollutes the environment.

According to the data published by Ministry of the Environment, 35% of tap water is used for laundry, followed by 25% in the rest room, and 20% in the kitchen and 20% in the bath room. In contrast, however, the drainage from the kitchen, which contains food and oil, represents 40% of total organic contaminant from ordinary household, followed by 30% from the rest room, 20% from the bath room, and only 10% from laundry.

In the region where drainage system is available, living drainage discharged from each household goes into one drainage tube and is collected at the sewage treatment plant (terminal treatment plant). The drain water is purified through the dirt precipitation and aeration process there, and is then returned to the sea or river. Thus, pollution is not a matter in the region where drainage system is available.

Penetration of drainage system in Japan is 73.7% (2010) on national average, which cannot be said that it advances over other developed countries. However, Japan is a mountainous country, and installing the drainage system fully across the country is rather inefficient. Instead, application of the amalgamation process septic tank, for instance, is recommended in such a region.

● Cause and spread of eutrophication problem

Nature has a system of self purification. In the aquatic environment like rivers and lakes, microorganism in the nature degrades organic substance and changes to inorganic substance. This action called biodegradation works even if organic contaminant is discharged.
　　
However, the balance of aquatic environment collapses when sewage containing excessive nutrients, i.e. phosphorus, nitrogen and carbon, flows into closed water environment such as lakes, marshes or bays. This phenomenon happens with increased population, concentrated industrial facilities, etc. As a result, the biological purification system in the nature doesn't sufficiently function. This phenomenon is so-called eutrophication. The negative impact on aquatic life, e.g. the red tide generation, derived from the eutorophication is one of the important aquatic environment problems.

A campaign to promote using soap took place in Shiga Prefecture in the 1970's on this background. The local government and the residents strongly promoted a movement to remove synthetic detergent and replace it with powder soap, attributing the cause of the Lake Biwa eutrophication problem to the phosphorus contained in detergent. This widely appeared in mass-media as an advanced consumer movement in Japan. This movement further turned into a campaign to banish detergent and spread all over the country a wrong image that detergent is bad. In terms of powder soap which Shiga Prefecture and the resident group vigorously pursued in place of detergent, current scientific position is that it is difficult to judge which is better. In fact, the central government research result through various experiments and technical examination concluded that synthetic detergent and soap have both merits and demerits to the environment.

It is true that original detergent contained phosphate as a supplementary ingredient (builder). The industry after all accelerated development of non-phosphate detergent without underestimating the social movement at that time. The conversion to non-phosphate detergent was completed in 1985, even though there were a lot of doubts technically in the theory to assume that detergent is a primary cause of the eutrophication.

● Ecological risk assessment of surfactant

Present detergent contains surfactant, e.g. LAS, which has excellent biodegradability, and, up to now, any issue such as an increase of surfactant concentration in the river water has not been reported even in the region where drainage system is not available. In the survey at the sewage treatment plant, it has been confirmed that 96.5% of the organism and 99.5% of surfactant are removed.

JSDA conducted risk assessment on aquatic ecosystem based on the surfactant concentration data in rivers measured by the monitoring study etc. which JSDA has executed for a long term, in combination with the toxicity evaluation result to the aquatic lives such as water flea, algae, and fishes. As a result, it is technically determined that the maximum concentration of surfactant, e.g. LAS, in the environment is considerably lower than that of the no-observed-effect level to the aquatic life, leading to a conclusion that the ecological risk is low. This is also supported by OECD, which officially published in 2005 internationally regarding the environmental impact of LAS that the ecological risk is low.

● First of all, proper usage must be understood.

JSDA has always advocated that proper amount of detergent must be used because it is the most important factor in order for consumers to obtain expected cleansing performance. Maintaining proper usage of detergent is also a means to reduce environmental load or economical burden, which may be unnecessarily increased by the excessive use of detergent.
　　
A consumer who is doing housekeeping as a daily work, however, might no longer care the proper usage of detergent. Given this as possible practice, what we’d like to re-emphasize is that cleansing performance doesn't increase even if more detergent is used. The performance doesn't go up very much with increased usage of detergent, while it rather results in negative consequence such as needing extra water for rinsing. On the other hand, soil cannot be removed sufficiently, when the usage is less than the amount recommended, but rather causes smelling and graying problems. In net, it is very important for consumers to use the proper amount of detergent.

● Proper product usage from the point of micelle formation

How is proper product usage determined? It is related to the micelle concentration from the science point of view. Surfactant that is the source of cleaning performance forms the molecular assembly called micelle when it exceeds some concentration. The surfactant concentration at that time is defined as cmc (critical micelle concentration). In the laundry water, the micelle has a function to remove and disperse soil attached on fabric, and prevent from redepositing the soil onto fabric (anti-redeposition). Thus, laundry product is designed so that the micelle concentration greater than cmc can be maintained when the consumer follows the recommended usage. Recommended usage, however, is different by product because cmc is determined by the product composition and formula.

● Safety is also taken into consideration in defining recommended usage and dosage.

In order to define the usage and dosage of household consumer product like detergent, the manufacturer conducts the human safety risk assessment based on various safety data including acute toxicity, chronic toxicity, the dermal irritation, carcinogenicity, reproduction toxicity etc. In addition, the product is designed so that the safety at certain level should be secured even if the product is misused or accidentally ingested. Finally, legitimacy of the product design and recommended usage is verified via actual use test.

In net, product safety of detergent is fully secured as long as the consumer follows its recommended usage and dosage recommended in the usage instruction.
　　
However, it is true that some still insist "Detergent shouldn't be used because it is bad for the human body and the environment" and continue to publish information based on wrong interpretation of science. For instance, those people continuously believe without any doubt that "Cockroach and goldfish die when the detergent is applied" is an experimental evidence to prove the hazardous property of detergent.
　　
At times, even media easily jumps into and makes public such wrong information that handmade soap is environment-friendly. It is therefore important to understand and verify the basis of the information and judge whether the information is trustworthy, when such information is received.

The following is detailed explanation of the labeling as an example.

The following three items are component for the labeling, but all are not necessarily shown on the label. There are cases that wording alone or nothing appears on the label according to the classification defined by GHS Implementation Guidance for Household Consumer Products.
(1) Pictogram: Pictogram shows hazard characteristics. It indicates the type and level of hazard property of the product.
(2) Signal Word: There are two kinds of wording; "Danger" and "Warning". “Danger” is greater in hazard level than “Warning”.
(3) Hazard Statement: Statement informing the hazard property and level by wording.
* Note: (JSDA-GHS) indicates that the classification and label are assigned based on GHS Implementation Guidance for Household Consumer Products developed and published by JSDA.

Please visit the following URL, in which GHS Implementation Guidance for Household Consumer Products is uploaded: http://jsda.org/w/01_katud/jsda/JSDA_GHS_guidance2011_E.pdf

< Execution points of chemical composition disclosure (summary)>

1. Product categories
Among products which JSDA member manufacturers handle, the voluntary standard is applied to the following product categories.

2. Execution points of the chemical composition disclosure

(1) Execution day
Manufacturers who are a member of JSDA will begin the chemical composition disclosure from November, 2011 or from products produced in November, 2011 along with the execution principles shown below.
Note) In case of out-sourced product, the execution should be discussed between the consigner and the consignee.

(2) Principles of the disclosure
　Chemical name and its function or formulating purpose should be disclosed for all the ingredients, which are intentionally formulated in the product. Detailed execution principles are as follows;
･ Chemicals whose content is 1% or more should be indicated in order with the content, and chemicals whose content is less than 1% can be indicated at random.
･ Chemicals which are unintentionally contained in the product are not required for indication.
･ All the chemicals for the function of perfume, colorant or preservative can be rounded as "Perfume", "Colorant" or "Preservative", all the chemicals for the function of enzyme can be rounded as "Enzyme", and all the chemicals for the function of fluorescent whitening agent can be round as "Fluorescent whitening agent".

(3) Method for the disclosure
　　Manufacturer s should select one or more means from the followings for the disclosure along with the above-mentioned principles.

Note) Disclosed information should be updated as appropriate when the product composition is changed.