dawn dish soap vs homesteading

I was on the road and visiting a homestead and there it was.  I know that I need about a quarter of "dawn" compared to what I'm used to.

Let me plug what I use quickly:  

   oasis brand dish soap for greywater systems
   oasis brand laundry detergent for greywater systems

If they have it, get it now.  Because it is available only half the time.  So when it is available, you need to stock up.



Dawn is amazingly powerful stuff!  And for damn near everything I advocate, I can spell out how what I advocate saves you money or adds luxury to your life.  But I cannot do that for dawn.  Switching to what I am about to suggest (a different product, and a collection of techniques) ...   well, the techniques will give you more time because your work will be more effective.  And it will save you money as you use less water.  But when it comes to doing the magic that soap does, I cannot beat dawn ....    unless you are a homesteader and you are using a septic tank, drain field, and drink from your well water.   Or, you are a permaculture homesteader and your kitchen sink is routed to a mulch pit.


any soap or detergent in a drain field or mulch pit

If you live in the city, any soap that goes down the drain gets mixed into poop, and then the poop is mostly fished out, and the remaining poop koolaid is dumped into the river.  The fish hate it.  The microbials hate it.  It causes a list of problems.



If you are using a septic tank and drain field, most soaps pass right through untouched.  They carry a lot of toxicity.  There is a very good chance that the bacteria in your tank that are working to break down organic material will not be able to do as good of a job.  and the bacteria breaking down organic material in the drainfield will also be poisoned and do a poor job.  So not only do you end up with soap going to your ground water, but a lot of other gross stuff too.  And you will need to pump your septic tank more often.  

With a mulch pit, the sad story comes through faster.  The plants that are part of the mulch pit will become sad and die.

And this is with any soap, just being soap.  Or detergent.  Of course, some have a hundred times more toxicity in addition to the whole thing of being soap.  And some break down more readily than others.


Step 1:  easy and delightful ways to reduce soap use

I am constantly baffled by people using soap to clean EVERYTHING!  Soap is an emulsifier.  The thing it does is make grease and oil water soluble.  If you don't have grease or oil, soap will do nothing for you.  I have watched people clean something (with zero grease or oil) by washing it with water, then soaping it up (with lots of water) and then thoroughly rinsing it off.  The funny thing is that the thing they were holding was perfectly clean before the soap stage.  So they used two or three times more water and time to get it soapy.  They made a clean thing filthy with soap!  And now they have to clean off the soap.  And that might take even more water than all the water that has been used so far.  In the end, for some things that can be cleaned without any soap, people will use ten times more time and ten times more water by cleaning that thing with soap!

  - don't use soap on things that have zero grease or oil

  - let cats and dogs help with removing grease and oil
        (it cuts on the kibble! And they are so happy!)
        (there are many thoughts on this topic, so maybe skip this one)

  - big gobs of waste grease and oil should never go down the sink
        (if i can charm cats or dogs, I will. Otherwise it becomes rocket mass heater fuel. If you don't have those two, then I think the landfill is the wisest path))

  - let hot water and a pinch of scrubbing do most of the work
        (this can be a 100% solution)

  - if it is coconut oil or certain other greases or oils that are on my skin, rather that removing it with soap, I will rub it into the skin on my arms.

  - Nearly all things I am cleaning because "ew, gross" - citric acid is better unless grease or oil is involved
      (I always eat a little every time)
      (some weirdos prefer apple cider vinegar)
      (most of the world, outside of the US, prefers lemon juice)

  - some gross gummy things won't budge with soap, but come right off with citric oil goo

  - let some stuff have a little oil residue

I am limiting this list to just kitchen sink stuff.  It is temping to make the list ten times longer adding in the cleaning of the oven, a kettle, bathroom sinks, the shower, laundry, cleaning the floors, dishwasher stuff, etc.


don't use soap on things that have zero grease or oil

One example out of thousands:  A plate where dry toast went for a short ride.  A bit of a rinse and this plate is clean.  There is no oil or grease.  Adding soap does nothing but create a new job of cleaning off the soap.  

Oats in a pot:  no oil or grease, so adding soap just makes something else to clean off.  

The white residue in a kettle:  soap will only make things worse.  Citric acid will clear that out in a flash.


let cats and dogs help with removing grease and oil

Personally, I find that cleaning stinky cat spit off of a plate is more challenging than cleaning oil or grease off of a plate.  But the cats sure are happy.  



I have heard some people shudder at the idea because dogs and cats lick their butts.  Fair point!


big gobs of waste grease and oil should never go down the sink

If you have cats or dogs and you are worried about the butt licking thing, you can try to get as much of the oil and grease into their bowl as possible without having the animals touch the people plate/bowl/pan/whatever.

After that, I keep all of that stuff to burn later in a rocket mass heater.  Maybe a greasy paper towel.  Or maybe as a small, waxed carton full of grease.  

If these things don't work for you, the last resort is to send it to the land fill.  A huge grease load in your plumbing or septic tank or sewage treatment plant is not a good thing.


hot water and a pinch of scrubbing do most of the work

It is possible to clean dishes with cold water (and more soap) or with zero soap (and a lot of hot water).   As a guy that frets about the environment from far too many angles, I try to find a path where I can have super clean dishes, but with less hot water and less soap.  I think I tend to shoot for using 99% less soap than average, and 70% less hot water.

The next time you are facing an impossibly greasy plate, try to clean it with only hot water and zero soap.  I think you will be amazed.  


good oil/grease vs. yucky

Sometimes I get pure coconut oil on my hands. I keep a tiny jar of it in my bathroom to help heal bits of rough skin.  Amazing stuff.  So if I get a bit on my hands while cooking, I rub it on my arms.  Whatever is left goes on the other hand and the two hands rub it in.  Good stuff!  And if anybody sees me do this I always say "for the ladies!" thinking that now i smell a bit coconut.  Same for olive oil.  

But if my hands have a grease or oil that is not perfect, while working with food, then a first pass with warm water followed by a few rounds of a little soap until I feel certain it is all gone.


Cleaning the really gross stuff - I start with citric acid

Warm water and scrubbing usually gets 98%.  If anything is left, a bit of citric acid is next.  The chemical reaction between yucky stuff and citric acid is delightful to watch.  It's acid!  And it is edible!   "You wanna stick to MY pot!  Let me introduce you to my little friend!"   Sssssssssssss.   BWA HA HA HA!

Soap rarely helps.  It would be a waste of perfectly good soap.

Most of the time I am working with citric acid, I lick a bit of my finger, dip into the citric acid, and lick it off. So if you come to my house ...   you can imagine that there is some tiny amount of paul-spit in there.

Here is the citric acid i get.



Some weirdos prefer Apple Cider Vinegar.  After ten years of that, I am sick of the smell.  I think the weirdos are not YET sick of the smell.

Andres tells me that my thing with citric acid is sooooooo american.  The rest of the world uses lemon juice.  I have to admit that lemon juice definitely smells better than apple cider vinegar.  


some gross gummy things won't budge with soap, but come right off with citric oil goo

About four times per year, I encounter something gummy.  Sometimes other people cannot clean it with soap and they are giving up.  The citric acid will be faster than the soap, but for the right kind of gummy I reach immediately for this weird citric oil goo that smells good when you use it.  A small bottle will last me about 30 years. https://amzn.to/3GIH6fm




let some stuff have a little oil residue

I'm talking about more than a cast iron pan.  I think we all know about leaving a little oil residue on a cast iron pan.

I have a little tea strainer that I use for making coffee. I am pretty sure that I am the only person that ever uses it.  Every day it gets a 4 second rinse.  It looks perfectly clean, but I suspect there is a very thin layer of coffee oils hidden somewhere on it.  A bit more effort with some hot water, or a bit of soap would take care of that.  But I leave it.  Maybe once every three months it will get a bit more of a wash.  I have used it every day for 15 years and it still looks brand new, but I do think that there might be invisible somethings on it ....   but I'm the only person that uses it and I feel confident that it is plenty clean.  Using soap on it would feel, to me, like a huge waste of perfectly good soap!


the love of soap

some people have a strong emotional connection to using soap.  A lot.  Lots and lots of soap on lots and lots of things that should never be touched by soap.  Soap up and rinse off.  Soap up and rinse off.  Soap up and rinse off.  Soap. Soap. Soap.   To these people I want to suggest that there can be a path where some things are even cleaner without soap.  My guess is that it will take five years of thousands of trial and error experiments to get to the point that soap use eventually dwindles down to "average."


the quality of dish soap

I hope that the stuff above will persuade you to gradually use less soap over the next few years.  Especially if you like to use dawn.  

The math for all of this stuff gets tricky because when the mission is to get grease off of something, you will use less dawn than anything else.  So 80% less soap, in general.  And if you were to dilute it 10-to-1 you might use even less.

I don't really want to get into the toxins and problems and all that.  I'll leave that giant document to others.   Instead, I will say, that I use oasis dish soap https://amzn.to/46qNGBZ which was designed for use in greywater systems.  And while I have some deeeeeep concerns about this product, it is, in my mind, about 15% better than doctor bronners.  Which is better than any of the eco offerings which are all better than dawn and the parade of "regular" dish soaps.



I am going to speculate that washing something with dawn will use less than a quarter of the volume of the soap, but the toxic load of dawn will be about eight times more toxic than the larger volume of oasis.  In other words, if you use oasis, you use more of it, but it is, overall, still, far less toxic.

I do want to say that using soap nuts is better, but soap nuts need to be used correctly, and I find I don't have the discipline and patience for it.




the klunky wrap

For more than two years I have been chasing some wild health comedies.  For two major ailments I have solved with "food as medicine".  But it has taken a giant bite out of my time.  

I realized that there are about one hundred articles I have yet to write, like this article.  And the apex of it all is to make one easy, cohesive movie (and book) to share. I thought I was being clever in making the movie first.  And now that the kickstarter is doing poorly, I realize that the movie sounds pretty crazy without the 100 articles.  So here is one.  

Here is a link to the movie.

I made some small edits.

It’s a good article but you might want to add this, I learned from my mother. When we had leftover grease, oil or butter, she would mix it with bird seeds and put it in the freezer. Then when winter came, she would hang the fat and seed mix in the trees, so the birds had a high calorie food to help them through the winter. She would use any leftover container and keep them in the freezer. They usually wouldn’t be full each time, but slowly fill up with leftovers and seeds. The seeds she would forage when we went on walks in the marshes or forests where I grew up.
I just keep a grease container in the fridge and reuse it for dinner. If I have too much, I mix it with our chicken feed and feed it to them. They love fat and I get more eggs.

Ulla Bisgaard wrote:It’s a good article but you might want to add this, I learned from my mother. When we had leftover grease, oil or butter, she would mix it with bird seeds and put it in the freezer. Then when winter came, she would hang the fat and seed mix in the trees, so the birds had a high calorie food to help them through the winter. She would use any leftover container and keep them in the freezer. They usually wouldn’t be full each time, but slowly fill up with leftovers and seeds. The seeds she would forage when we went on walks in the marshes or forests where I grew up.
I just keep a grease container in the fridge and reuse it for dinner. If I have too much, I mix it with our chicken feed and feed it to them. They love fat and I get more eggs.

Excellent!  

I like the idea of feeding it to the chickens.  And if you don't have chickens, you can feed it to the wild birds!

For much of my cleaning, I just use baking soda. Works well, but sometimes requires more effort and time than using soap.

paul wheaton wrote:
I know that I need about a quarter of "dawn" compared to what I'm used to.

This is a little odd to me. When you say a quarter of "dawn" do you mean a US $0.25 or quarter of a bottle? I think TBS or tps would explain the amount better.

Jane Bartlett wrote:For much of my cleaning, I just use baking soda. Works well, but sometimes requires more effort and time than using soap.

I use baking soda too, but I add some corse salt to it. The salt help removing stuck food, so you don’t have to use as much force.

I use Dawn in the foam spray bottle and refill it with more diluted. A spray on just the greasy spot or the scrubber gets it off with much less rising.  The scrubber my do several more items without having to use any more.  The oat meal, egg or cheese residue may just need to soak a little longer just leave tm in the sink while rinsing other things.

"This is a little odd to me. When you say a quarter of "dawn" do you mean a US $0.25 or quarter of a bottle? I think TBS or tps would explain the amount better."

I think that Paul is saying he would only need about 1/4 the amount of Dawn as compared to the Oasis soap that he buys. No measurement needed, it's just a relative comparison of cleaning power.

I love this and can't wait to share it in its final form. Suggestions coming later today.

Excellent article, Paul. So many important points here. I had forgotten about citric acid, so that bit is really helpful, thank you!

People I've had this discussion with seem to associate cleaning with the suds soap makes. The idea is that if there's no suds, then the dishes aren't clean. The suds actually have little to nothing to do with it. But soap does cut grease, as you point out. If I can just scrub with hot water and no soap, that does such a good job. All of our house and laundry greywater goes into a mulch pit which drains into a swale, so I am really careful about what goes down all the drains.

One thing I use is soap nuts, for both dishes and laundry. I can't find anything to contraindicate them for greywater, but they do contains saponins to cut grease.

For pots and pans that have food sticking to, I like these stainless steel chain mail scrubbers.


Image source: Amazon

They advertise them for cast iron, but they work great on stainless steel cookware and stubborn food sticking to plates and bowls too. I can use it on my cast iron with a bit of hot water and not remove the protective oil coating on the cast iron.

Great work, Paul.  I totally agree with this great content.

My wife and I have gone “pooless” for a while now.  It’s amazing how long soap and shampoo bottles last when you hardly ever use them.  $$$AVINGS!!!

I’ve been trying to apply that principle to dishwashing where possible.  I agree:  grease and oil are the only things that need soap (or something else).  

Our septic system has been getting weird this summer and we’re trying to help out the bacteria.  Hopefully we don’t need a major, costly intervention to get it less soggy and boggy (and stinky) down there.

We make a lot of sourdough bread, so I'd like to point out that raw flour isn't great for going down the pipe, unless it's pretty short. First, I use a spatula to get as much of the dough off as possible, dumping it in the compost for the worms unless I have something for the chickens on the go. Then we rinse the pot with a scrubby and pour that on my front porch planters. I figure there's something - microbes, worms, pill bugs in the planter that will eat it up.

As for grease, I cut up old cotton shirts/etc into about 3"x3" squares and wipe greasy plates with that and then it goes into the fire kindling box, or the biochar bin, or sometimes in the summer, into the compost. This is just the residual grease - if there's a lot, I tend to use it for cooking, unless it's from a roost goose - then it goes into making pastry!

If I do have something with a thin shine of grease on it, and feel I need to use a soap, I make sure I *don't* use water until I've put the soap on first. I find in that order, I hardly need any soap to saponify it, and then the water washes both down the drain. That pie plate I mentioned above, sometimes fits into that category!

Let's also talk about sterilization. Most of the time, a few microbes added to our collection of millions of microbes in and on our bodies, is not a big thing for most of us. However, if someone's got the Martian Death Flu and I really *don't* want it, what are our options? The 2 least nasty to the environment that I know of, are boiling water and cleaning vinegar (7 or 10%). Our house does have a septic system, and the experts will say that you shouldn't put a lot of vinegar down the drain, but the dose makes the poison, and a little bit to save me from getting sick is worth it. Usually the sick person only has a few dishes anyway, so a kettle of boiling water will do the job.

I fill the sink every morning with accumulated dishes, a little higher than the dishes (minus pots) with scalding hot water, then a small squirt of biodegradable dish soap, let it sit until I can get my hands in it, then wash them. The greasy pots get clear water in them, heated, accumulated, then I add red split lentils and ground fennel and make the base of the dog food du jour. That is usually their breakfast, and kibble for a light supper. That takes care of most of my grease, then the almost clean pan goes in the sink, and all the gray water is collected for the flush loo on a septic system. Well sometimes if the water is really clean, I wash other things with it before it gets flushed.

Thank you for the posting Paul the shiny! I clean my toilet with citric acid.

Great blog Paul.

I am not sure that using cats and dogs to clean pans is actually a problem.  We have been doing it for ages.  They also get the stuck on bits off which saves elbow grease.

On a cruise, I noted that only 1 in 20 blokes actually washed their hands after taking a leak or having a seated sojourn.  The first thing they touched was the dunny door and after they exited, then god only knows. We could guess that others also touched the same surfaces, serving utensils etc.  Having told my wife, she did the same checks in the ladies.  Same result.  I am proffering the opinion that these folk have the same habits at home and doubt that they wash their hands before doing the washing up. And what is on the kitchen towel?

Dogs arses, cats arses, or human arses - no problem - still arses with the same function.  I say go for it.

Since my guy started on a keto/carnivore diet, I've had a lot more grease to deal with.  I let the dogs lick any greasy or messy plates and bowls before I hand wash them using Seventh Generation dish soap.  The cats are much more picky, but the dogs have never turned anything down, and never brought any of it back up.  For the cast iron pans I pour out any excess grease, then wipe the pans with paper towels (not sustainable, but better than washing the grease into my septic system.)  Then if needed I use hot water and a metal scrubby to loosen stuck bits.  I really hate all the extra grease I have to deal with, but that diet got my partner off most junk food and eventually the heart and blood pressure and blood sugar meds he was on, so I guess I can't complain too much.  

I often reuse plates that only have a few crumbs on them, sometimes after rinsing, other times simply brushed off.  I never put them back into the cupboard unless they've been washed, but reusing them does mean I do dishes a bit less often.  I'll have to try that Oasis soap, I haven't heard of it before.

Jane Bartlett wrote:For much of my cleaning, I just use baking soda. Works well, but sometimes requires more effort and time than using soap.

Hey Jane and Ulla, baking soda cuts grease very well. It's actually making soap from the grease while you're using it if I understood correctly.
Anyways, also baking soda in large amounts is harmful to plants.

Benjamin Dinkel wrote:

, also baking soda in large amounts is harmful to plants.

I did an experiment with used baking soda I had cleaned out the pigeon tractor with, before it got a new covering of cheap reused plywood. It went on a fairly new compost hill and even the wild raspberries I put there didn't survive! It took two years before I had a bumper crop of cherry tomatoes on there. So yes, absolutely, it can kill plants.

Benjamin Dinkel wrote:. . .  also baking soda in large amounts is harmful to plants.

Part of the problem with baking soda, washing soda, hydrogen peroxide, soaps, and detergents is pH. They are all alkaline. So unless you're using greywater to water alkaline loving plants, they'll struggle and possibly die. That's why the laundry-to-landscape systems recommend flushing the system with rainwater periodically.

All of that is another good reason to use citric acid, to maybe help neutralize other cleaning products going down the drain.

I have an instinctual reaction to Dawn soap, and avoid it like the plague. It's been awkward to tell a neighbor I can't eat off your plate, or drink from the glass which reeks of Dawn residue..... I don't know what's in it, but certainly chemical fragrances. It bothered me that it was (supposedly) used on water fowl after the (supposed) Gulf oil spill years ago.
I use wood ash to clean stuff.

Don't see any typos and my comment is outdated due to environmental restrictions, but I thought it was interesting.  Years ago, in Central Fla with 20 ft of pure sand before limestone bedrock, we got a new washing machine.  My father and I had just dug up and cleaned the drainfield for our septic tank for the second time when we got a new clothes washer.  Thinking that the detergent was a contributing cause to the failure of the septic tank, he scrounged some discarded irrigation pipe from an orange grove and routed the wash water past a grapefruit tree to a "mulch pit."  The tree after a couple years was producing over a thousand grapefruit.  It died the year after the plumbing was all connected to a sewer line.  Then they banned phosphate in detergents so it probably would have died anyway.  
Since the chemistry of the detergents has changed so much in the past 70 some years, this anecdote does nothing to refute your position but I sure did like those grapefruit.  

Ari Ellis wrote:I use wood ash to clean stuff.

Do you just use it straight?  On all kinds of dishes?  Do you need to wear gloves?  I have a bin of ashes from my woodstove I can experiment with, but don't want to damage anything out of ignorance.  I sprinkle it over my gravel driveway to keep weeds and such in check, and a little goes onto my compost pile every so often, but since we heat with the woodstove I still have more I can use.  I know I could make lye with them, and then soap, but haven't set aside time to play with that yet.

Ari Ellis wrote:
I use wood ash to clean stuff.

Great you mentioned wood ash! When I camp, I use it to degrease pans. I noticed that mountain finches love the greasy ashes! They clean it up before bears can find it.

I can never get enough wood ash! Great for keeping the flies away after picking up dog poop!

It's a great dewormer as well: testament being my pigeons will eat small quantities.

Most dish detergents (especially dawn!) Leave me with a rash on my hands. And yes many of them leave a residue i can taste and smell on "clean" dishes.

If you use the gentler "environmentally friendly" dish soaps and have hard water, add a healthy splash of white vinegar to your sink full of hot, soapy water.

I find i can use half as much detergent if i do this, and things come out feeling cleaner, particularly plastics which are IMO difficult to clean well.

A slice of lemon with some baking soda, coarse salt, or wood ash works beautifully, as a grease cutter. I have keep a dish cloth or gloves between my skin and the coated lemon, because it will strip the oils from my skin. Wood ash works so well, all it takes to clean the glass on our woodstove door is a damp paper towel, which then can be used on something else in need (front door window, maybe?), before wiping up a mess, and being tossed back in the wood stove, as a fire starter.

We have a septic, for black water, only. Everything else goes to a graywater system that leads directly onto the surface, then over about 100yds of rocks, clay, and possibly some soil, as it is absorbed by a very happy jungle of who knows what kind of plants (ok, I know what some are, but haven't gone through to name every plant, shrub, and tree on that steep slope), before it finally hits our pond, that's full of fish, frogs, and turtles, and draws herons, eagles, hawks, owls, ducks, deer, raccoons, coyotes, wildcats, foxes, rabbits, armadillos, opossums, squirrels, and the occasional mountain lion or bear. I'm sure I'm missing others. I'm also not sure how much of the health of this amazing ecosystem flourishes because of our pickiness about what goes into it, and how much is simply in spite of our failures.

Great tips for saving money and using less dish detergent.

Safety Data Sheets (sds) are enlightening.   It amazes me what is in these things.  And confirms my desire to only use food safe substances to clean food related accoutrements.

if using citric acid for non-greasy cleaning, is it dangerous for desert soil to increase the acidity? Currently greywater has to go from sink or tub straight to the ground, and it's so dry here I worry the acid would have an effect on plants, bacteria, fungi, and the tortoises who go subterranean part of the year. Also one time I used vinegar to clean some brass and apparently didn't get all of it out, it got into some tiny crevices etc and corroded the brass.

While doing a few dishes this morning I feel compelled to add this thought:

I always take a moment to be grateful for dishes that need to be washed because they wouldn't need washing if there weren't food to put on them. My form of this grateful meditation goes, "thank you God for the dishes".

Thanks for this post. I try to only buy plant based dish, laundry And shampoo/conditioner. I'm going to give Oasis a try. I'm always looking for something better.
Citric acid also works great for removing hard water stains.
Does anyone have a suggestion for a good inexpensive biodegradable plant based hand soap? My son is a bit of a germaphobe. He washes his hands very often. It's the one soap I haven't switched because of cost, but I would really like to. I guess even if it's more expensive I can get one of those foamer soap dispensers and add water.
Thanks

My solution for stuck-on food in pots is to put a bit less than an inch of water in it, put it on the stove with the lid on until it boils with lots of steam, then leave it (with the lid still on) to cool down. Stuff usually scrubs off very easily after that.

We clean all our dishes just with hot water. Works fine. One way to handle greasy plates is to serve bread or rice with greasy food, then the bread or rice can be used to mop up the grease so it can be eaten, and the plate is then easy to clean just with water.

Okay, you've convinced me, we'll switch to Oasis for the kitchen sink soap, baby steps.  We're almost out of our Dawn bottle.

For those using a fair amount of baking soda and vinegar:

You can buy 8% cleaning vinegar to store a smaller quantity than regular vinegar (I buy mine from my local hardware store). It's also perfect for cleaning glass and vinyl (cars)

Baking soda:
Once I started buying from feed stores, I learned that there is a connection between "Cow Brand" and baking soda. I know: all you farmers are laughing

If you want to buy a large quantity of baking soda, the cheapest way is to buy a 50 lb bag at the feed store.

Many farmers use it for their cows, if they are bagging up hay rounds (giant marshmallows) and feeding fermented hay to help with digestion. (I gather the ratio is one or two regular to one fermented.)

have never used dawn or oasis so can't compare.

we buy bulk Azure dish soap...a gallon lasts a year I think...maybe less if we have company.
https://www.azurestandard.com/shop/brand/azure-clean/1862
Otherwise, yes, a little baking soda or washing soda and home grown luffa scrubbers.
For many things a nice long soak is all that's needed and as Paul says non greasy things don't need soap.
We find that cream is the most difficult although hot water is sometimes enough.
Olive oil is easy without soap.

I have to speak up for luffas...picked and cured correctly the cut sponges last a long long time used for washing dishes and I have this theory that scrubbing with them causes some bubble action and helps release oils with no soap.  It's also important to have several so we can choose a dry one first....ours have a wire shelf above the sink that gets some sun.
...and when they are used up they are tossed in the compost.

Long ago, when we were in the cabin, more like upscale camping....river sand was a big part of scrubbing up the iron and other things...and I loved sand as a body scrub also...those were the days of outdoor showers and a sink that drained directly to the garden.

EDITED to say that that gallon of dish soap is STILL a lot!!!
even for a whole year.
I think we can cut back even more...will set a goal to cut that amount in half year by year so by the time I'm 80yrs  we'll be down to a cup or so 😊

Judith Browning wrote:I have to speak up for luffas...

I think this is a great thing to remember! I grew loofahs one year and i have two large feed bags still full of them (after giving away MANY). We use them for everything, and they are amazing. They are so easy to grow and eliminate so much nasty ick. I've had friends come over and say "i use one in the shower but never thought of using one to wash the dishes", to which I say, never too late to start! That's one less plastic sponge and all the ick and gick that goes with it.

Another thing I'd like to add is to not underestimate the power of using LESS. I started using a foamer for dish soap and shampoo. it you mix in 60-80% water and it foams up what you're using, so you use much less. If you have a pump bottle, you can put a rubber band around the bottom to draw up less with each pump. And the old timey way of washing dishes, with a contraption to swish a bit of soap through your water, did the same thing-- used much less. People might think they can't "just stop" using shampoo or soap or dish soap or whatever, but they can start somewhere. And as many of us have found out, it is a road that can lead to fun developments (like making our own soap, or abandoning shampoo entirely, or using things we can make/grow/forage ourselves).

Hans Quistorff wrote:I use Dawn in the foam spray bottle and refill it with more diluted. A spray on just the greasy spot or the scrubber gets it off with much less rising.  The scrubber may do several more items without having to use any more.  The oat meal, egg or cheese residue may just need to soak a little longer just leave tm in the sink while rinsing other things.

I do the same, except that I have noted that Dawn PowerSpray, as the spray form is called, is somewhat more efficient in cleaning greasy things, so I buy PowerSpray refills as needed. Both formulas seem to have left the competition "in the dust" (or the grease ).

As you noted, a little goes a long way, a point I think Paul undersold. I'm on a well and septic system and can see no negative consequences from any of the soap/detergent that my wife and I use. We use water-efficient appliances, treat our well water for unpleasant mineral content, and get the 50 year old septic tank pumped out about every 8-10 years (whether it actually needs it or not) and have never experienced any sign of a problem. For me, efficiency is the primary consideration, whether of amount of cleaner and water used or the time and physical effort required to do the job.

By the way, the last time I did my semi-annual car wash, I discovered that Dawn PowerWash worked as well as specialty sprays for cleaning road "tar" from the door bottoms and rocker panels.