Word: syndetic
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...Syndet stands for synthetic detergent. Handed in sudsy quantity to the happy housewife after World War II, syndets proved so popular that they now account for 70% of all household cleansers, marketed under a series of bouncy monosyl lables as synthetic as themselves - Tide, Fab, Cheer, Breeze, Duz, Surf. During 1961, U.S. housewives bought 3,469,114,000 lbs., or $831 million worth...
Such popularity is indeed deserved: syndets do the job better. They dissolve the greasiest grease and dirtiest dirt, leave no scum behind, make clothes cleaner and cutlery more coruscating. But the result of all this cleanliness is a mountain of foam. Most of it is created by the high-sudsing detergents used for household work or washing dishes in the sink. Such detergents sometimes cause foam to back up stories high in the pipes of tall apartment buildings. A high-sudsing syndet falling through a pipe from the 15th floor may enlarge itself 17,000 times by the time...
...folk County, a glass of water from the tap is likely to have a detergent head on it like a schooner of beer. The city dweller does not suffer nearly so much from syn dets in his water, but he probably does most to contribute to the syndet problem...
Gourmet's Delight. The reason for all the trouble is that most syndets are made of petroleum derivatives that are all but indestructible. Instead of breaking down in the soil and becoming food for bacteria as does soap - a nonsynthetic detergent made of animal and vegetable fats - the syndet remains active long after it goes down the drain, bubbling on and on through rivers and lakes and often seeping through the earth from septic tanks to well water (where its foamy presence may be a valuable warning that sewage is seeping in too). European waterways also foam with detergent...
...Seep-Out. Most experts agree that syndet-spiked drinking water so far offers no serious threat to health. Government standards hold that drinking water may contain a half-part of detergent sudsing agent to a million parts of water, but this is based on the esthetic qualities of taste and foaminess rather than on toxicity...
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