Word: perce
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...practiced by the vast majority of laundry shops around the country, dry cleaning can be anything but clean. Most of the 35,000 dry cleaners in the U.S. use a colorless liquid called perchloroethylene (perc) as a solvent in the laundering process. Perc is not pretty - it's a volatile organic compound that in small doses can cause dizziness, headaches and respiratory irritation. Prolonged perc exposure has been linked to liver and kidney damage, and the government has identified the chemical as a potential occupational carcinogen...
Though the greatest risk is in the dry-cleaning workplace, perc can get into customers' homes and even into the air, water and soil when dry cleaners dispose of waste. But there are greener alternatives - and a growing number of cleaners taking advantage of them. One approach is to have your clothes professionally wet-cleaned, using cold water, mild soaps and a computer-controlled washing machine that spins very slowly, which reduces wear and tear on fabric. That may be the greenest method - wet cleaning uses no volatile organic chemicals at all and is more energy efficient than traditional...
Although green cleaners are still in the minority, government action from the top may make the shift inevitable - California is phasing out the use of perc, and other states will probably follow. "There's definitely a market out there," says Kistner. There's no reason dry cleaning has to dirty the earth...