Why are petroleum-based chemical products bad for humans, animals and the environment?

Petroleum oil has been used in cleaning products for decades, and is a very harmful ingredient for the environment, humans and animals. Its use is well known to be a massive factor in climate change.  Petroleum, or rock oil is a mixture of hydrocarbons, which are made up of hydrogen and carbon and are in solid, liquid, or gaseous form. In its natural form petroleum is known as crude oil and is a fossil fuel and a non-renewable energy. When burnt, it releases huge quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Oil drilling for petroleum is extremely bad for the environment as it disrupts wildlife, causes oil spills which can kill animals, destroys wildlands, produces dangerous emissions and causes air pollution. Air pollution can cause significant health problems for humans and animals. Petroleum-based solvents are used in traditional chemical cleaning products. Because it is so toxic, exposure to petroleum-based products can cause different and serious health problems.

What are common terms used to describe eco-friendly products?

Common terms used to describe these types of products are natural, organic, green, eco-friendly, biodegradable, ecological, environmental, and environmentally safe.

What are common terms used to describe biological products?

Some common terms used to describe biological products include bacterial, bio-enzyme, probiotic, microorganisms, bacilli, bacillus based, bugs (slang), microbes, and microbial.

What are common terms used to describe enzyme products?

Terms include enzyme and enzymatic or just usually appending words with the suffix “zyme”.

Is there a difference between eco-friendly and biological products?

There is a major difference. An eco-friendly product merely means that the chemical product is made from sustainable origins like plant bases. These typically break down and biodegrade in the environment over a period of time, typically a few days to a few weeks. The important thing to note is that a product which is eco-friendly doesn’t actively benefit the environment. A biological product however is environmentally beneficial. The use of a biological product means billions of beneficial microorganisms remain on surfaces, get washed down drains, sinks, urinals, toilets and then end up in our waste streams like grease traps, septic systems, pump stations (lift stations), and greywater systems which all then end up in wastewater treatment plants (WWTP). These microbes actively aid in permanently digesting organic waste, hugely benefitting the environment.

What are bacteria?

Bacteria are single-celled organisms that do not have well-defined organelles such as a nucleus. The cells are typically enclosed in a rigid cell wall and a plasma membrane. Bacteria contain all the genetic material necessary to reproduce, and they reproduce by simple cellular division. Bacteria show a wide range of nutrient requirements and energy-related metabolism. Some bacteria require only minerals and a carbon source such as sugar for growth, while others require more complex growth media. Bacteria play an extremely important role in recycling nutrients in the environment. Bacteria break down organic matter into simple compounds like carbon dioxide and water, and they cycle important nutrients such as nitrogen, sulphur, phosphorus. Bacteria can migrate to areas that are rich in specific nutrients that they require for growth. Bacteria can also attach themselves to surfaces and form communities known as biofilms.

What are enzymes?

An enzyme is a protein that acts as a catalyst. The enzyme is responsible for accelerating the rate of a reaction in which various substrates are converted to products through the formation of an enzyme-substrate complex. In general, each type of enzyme catalyses only one type of reaction and will operate on only one type of substrate. This is often referred to as a “lock and key” mechanism. Consequently, enzymes are highly specific and are able to discriminate between slightly different substrate molecules. In addition, enzymes exhibit optimal catalytic activity over a narrow range of temperature, ionic strength and pH.

Do enzymes break down any molecule or just specific ones, and how specific do they get?

The specificity of an enzyme for its substrate is generally a function of the enzyme’s “active site” or binding site. The structure of the protein determines the range of substrates or “keys” that can fit into the lock. Most enzymes are exquisitely specific. That is, they react only with one specific substrate. Some enzymes, however, have a more flexible active site that can accommodate molecules that are closely related to the target substrate. In this case, there is typically a preferred substrate with which the enzyme reacts at a higher rate than with related compounds.

Can enzymes adapt to different conditions and to different grease, oils and food?

Enzymes are not living things. They have no ability to adapt to changing conditions or substrate sources. Their level of activity is a function of these conditions. If they are not in optimal conditions, their activity decreases or stops.

Do bacteria break down any molecule or just specific ones, and how specific do they get?

Bacteria have the capability of producing many different types of enzymes. They are living organisms that respond to their environment. In general, bacteria can produce enzymes that degrade a wide variety of organic materials such as fats and oils (lipase), cellulose and paper (cellulase), xylan (xylanase), proteins (protease), starches (amylase), urea (urease), esters (esterase), phosphate groups from proteins (phosphatase) and non-cellulose polysaccharides (hemicellulose). It is important to note that all these materials are polymers that must be reacted with more than one type of enzyme in order to be efficiently degraded to their basic building blocks. Nature provides a specific “team” of enzymes to attack each type of polymer. For example, there are three different classes of enzymes (endocellulases, exocellulases, cellobiohydrolases) that are required to degrade a cellulose polymer into basic glucose units. All three types of enzymes are referred to as cellulases, but each class attacks a specific structure or substructure of the polymer. Acting individually, none of the cellulases is capable of efficiently degrading the polymer. Bacteria can produce the complete “team” of enzymes that are necessary to degrade and consume the organic materials present in their environment at any given time. Moreover, bacteria can produce multiple “teams” at the same time.

Can bacterium adapt to different conditions and to different grease, oils and food?

Bacteria can adapt to a range of conditions and food supplies. They can change the type of enzymes that they produce if the food source changes. They can protect themselves from changes in environmental conditions by forming colonies, biofilms, or spores. Importantly, bacteria live in “communities” made up of different species. Each species fills a biological niche, and the population of each species grows or declines in response to the environment. For example, a community may contain certain species that efficiently degrade grease, and other species that thrive on cellulose.

How long do enzymes work compared with bacteria?

All enzymes have a limited half-life (minutes to days, depending on conditions). They are proteins that are biodegradable and are subject to damage by other enzymes (proteases), chemicals, and extremes of pH and temperature. An important difference between enzyme-based products and bacterial products is that the enzymes can’t repair themselves or reproduce. Living bacteria, however, produce fresh enzymes on a continuous basis and can bounce back following mild environmental insults. Bacteria however, depending on the prevalent conditions, can survive and thrive for days, weeks and even many months.

How quickly do high enzyme producing bacteria (protease, lipase and amylase) produce enzymes, and in what quantities?

Production of enzymes begins as soon as the bacteria begin to grow. The cells must obtain nutrients from their surroundings, so they secrete enzymes to degrade the available food. The quantities of enzymes produced vary depending on the bacterial species and the culture conditions (e.g., nutrients, temperature, and pH) and growth rate. Hydrolytic enzymes such as proteases, amylases, and cellulases, etc. are produced in the range of milligrams per litre to grams per litre. Ecozyme™ products are specifically designed to contain various strains of different microorganisms which were uniquely cultured in selective media to change their enzyme production to specific types, thus they can produce a wide range of different types of proteases (multiple types), lipase (multiple types), amylases (multiple), xylanase, and urease etc.  It all depends on the available nutrients that need to be degraded.

Are these quantities enough to start to compare to straight or pure enzyme products?

Since we don’t have any information on the enzyme content of current “straight enzyme” products, it is difficult to answer this question. It is also a function of dosing of the product (i.e., how much, how often). In general, one can assume that the customer could have more control over initial enzyme concentration by adding a prepared enzyme product. However, bacterial cultures can produce competitive amounts of enzyme after a short colonization period. Bacteria can grow very quickly, doubling their populations in as little as 20-40 minutes. In some applications, it is common to “boost” bacterial colonization by adding a small amount of prepared enzyme to begin degrading the available food. This is often done in composting processes to jump-start the bacterial/fungal growth.

If you use just enzymes, how many different enzymes would you need to use to effectively eliminate grease, oils and food in a waste stream?

This is somewhat difficult to answer. This depends on what one would mean by “eliminate”. Significant degradation would require, at a minimum, several of each of the hydrolytic enzymes: proteases, cellulases, xylanases, amylases, lipases, pectinases, and esterases. Ideally, one would also need oxidative enzymes to degrade recalcitrant materials. Oxidative enzymes are expensive and impractical to manufacture, and they require complex co-factors. This type of enzyme is needed to degrade fatty acids, for example.

If grease and oil are broken down, will they regroup in the grease or fat trap or lift station again and reform to clog pipes and wet wells?

This depends upon how far the grease and oil are broken down. Fats are mainly composed of molecules called triglycerides. Triglycerides contain 3 long-chain fatty acids linked to a 3-carbon backbone (glycerol). The first step in the degradation of triglycerides is the cleavage of the 3 bonds that link the 3 fatty acids to the glycerol backbone. Lipases and esterases are the enzymes that catalyse this first step. While the reverse reaction is possible, it is energetically unfavourable, and the bonds will not re-form (expect under special circumstances). Generally, lipases will cleave one bond at a time to generate free fatty acids and mono- and di-glycerides. The free fatty acids can combine with calcium ions to form insoluble salts. These salts could cause clogs. However, bacteria, unlike straight enzyme products, have the ability to further degrade and utilize the free fatty acids.

What does happen to food particles and cellulose in grease traps or fat traps?

They are degraded over time if bacteria or appropriate enzymes are present. The more complex the “food”, the more time and enzyme it will take to break it down.

Will oil break down when you have just a few strains of grease enzymes?

The wider the variety of enzymes, the more effective and efficient the degradation. Lipases, for example, vary in the range of fatty acid chain length that they can accept as substrate when attacking triglycerides. Some prefer triglycerides with short-chain fatty acid substituents, others prefer long chain fatty acids. One or two lipases in a product will not be effective for all triglycerides.

If you have cooking oil in the water, will it encapsulate the enzymes or bacteria?

Most enzymes and bacteria are hydrophilic, or water-loving. They naturally repel oil but can exist at an oil/water interface. Under certain conditions when the oil concentration is much greater than the water concentration, an emulsion can form in which water drops containing enzymes/bacteria are dispersed throughout the oil.

Do aerobic or facultative anaerobic bacteria contribute to odours or eliminate them?

Aerobic and facultative anaerobic bacteria do not generate the offensive compounds (e.g., hydrogen sulphide) that cause odours.

Some facilities will only use air and indigenous bacterium saying any other added bacteria cause odours, can this happen?

The odours are a function of the air supply. The odours are typically caused by anaerobes. Anaerobic bacteria are always present in indigenous populations, and can thrive in pockets of low oxygen concentration, even under aerobic conditions. Ecozyme’s bacterial products of the absolute highest quality are consequently free of contamination by anaerobes and will not cause odours. However, if bacterial products are added to a system and the air supply is not increased proportionately to accommodate the increase in biological activity, the whole system will go into oxygen deprivation and the indigenous anaerobes will begin to thrive and generate odours. If bacteria are added, the air supply must be carefully monitored and increased accordingly to prevent odours from the indigenous population.

What is the difference between good bacteria and bad, harmful pathogenic bacteria?

Pathogenic bacteria cause many serious diseases including pneumonia (Streptococcus pneumoniae), meningitis (Haemophilus influenzae), strep throat (Group A Streptococcus), food poisoning (Escherichia coli and Salmonella), and a variety of other infections. Despite these harmful bacteria, human and animal bodies harbour a haven of tens of trillions of beneficial bacteria. They are essential to our survival and those of the planet. They help our bodies digest food and absorb nutrients, and they produce many important vitamins. They may also protect us against pathogenic bacteria by crowding them out in the gut, producing acids that inhibit their growth, and stimulating the immune system to fight them off. As very simple way to illustrate this, have you ever wondered why after a visit to the Doctor and antibiotics are prescribed, that you are usually given probiotics to ingest? This is because the antibiotics indiscriminately kill the good microbes in our gut, and the probiotics are needed to restore good gut health and balance.

How many bacteria are typically in your products and how are they measured?

The bacteria are in spore form and are measured in a SANAS Accredited Laboratory using a Total Plate Count (TPC) to British Pharmacopoeia standards. This is then counted as Colony Forming Units (CFU) and this is measured per millilitre (for liquids) and per grams (for powdered or solid products). The minimum typical count in finished formulations is typically a function of 1 x 10⁷ per ml or g (10 million per ml or g, or also indicated as 1E7). This then increases to as high as 1 x 10⁹ per ml or g (1 billion per ml or g, or also indicated as 1E9). It is important to note that these counts apply to end of shelf life as a minimum count. At the time of manufacture, they are in fact vastly higher than these guaranteed minimums, often as high as 1 x 10¹¹ .

Can bio-enzyme products protect against super bugs or disinfectant resistant bacteria?

In February 2021 the Saturday Star published an article “Sanitizer superbug: Concern over disinfectant-resistant bacteria which could cause another pandemic”. Professor Robert Bragg of the University of the Free State raised concern around the possibility for bacteria to become disinfectant resistant. Specifically a strain of the bacteria Serratia marcescens has become resistant to disinfectants and it was hypothesised to possibly be a sign of things to come where humankind could end up facing a pandemic worse than Covid-19. Some bacteria strains already have the ability to bypass modern day medications, effectively making them drug resistant. Ecozyme made contact with Professor Bragg, and offered up a proprietary and synergistically performing microbial consortium used in all of its cleaning application probiotic products. Professor Bragg’s Laboratory Report tested the Ecozyme™ microbes against the Serratia marcescens pathogen as well as against the Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus pathogens. Incredibly Professor Bragg’s report concluded that the pathogenic bacteria were eliminated, proving their incredible effectiveness compared to even chemical disinfectants that were ineffective against the strain.

How do probiotic products offer superior cleaning benefits as opposed to even harsh chemicals?

As opposed to conventional chemical cleaners which are limited in application, microbes can achieve a deeper, microscopic level clean. Research shows that with conventional cleaning chemicals, surfaces can become contaminated very soon after cleaning. Microbial cleaners can actually extend cleaning applications’ effectiveness by making their way between the microscopic cracks and crevices of surfaces, continuously breaking down unseen grime and effectively controlling the unwanted bacteria that produce stains and undesirable odours long after they’ve been applied. In fact, microbial cleaners are proven to be powerful performers: Further studies tested the use of probiotic cleaners in hospitals determined that they reduce the occurrence of drug-resistant bacteria, and in another study on disinfectant, soap, or probiotic cleaning several surfaces were tested with a conclusion that these naturally-derived cleaners can effectively form stable surface biofilms while excluding pathogens, which is impossible for conventional chemicals to achieve.    

Why is it important to have an actual green certification from an accredited certifying body?

Greenwashing is the process of conveying a false impression or misleading information about how a company’s products are environmentally sound. Greenwashing involves making an unsubstantiated claim to deceive consumers into believing that a company’s products are environmentally friendly or have a greater positive environmental impact than they actually do. By having one’s products certified and accredited by an independent green verification company, this gives absolute peace of mind.

Are probiotic products good at getting rid of odours, especially examples of ones caused by pets, in urinals, toilets, showers, basis and drains, or even odours from dustbins and refuse rooms?

Unpleasant smells are often caused by bad bacteria that multiply rapidly, especially in humid and warm conditions. Probiotics encapsulate and decompose the molecule that is releasing the unpleasant odour. They break down the whole odour molecule as a natural food source. Unlike bad bacteria, good probiotic bacteria do not create smells: the gases they produce when decomposing organic contamination are non-odorous. Competitive exclusion reduces the numbers of harmful bacteria and prevents them – and the accompanying odour – from returning, working for days after application and keeping surfaces and spaces free of odours for longer.

Are probiotic products greywater safe?

Probiotic products are not only greywater system safe, but they immensely benefit greywater and septic systems.