Today on one of my conservation listservs, I got this nifty announcement from NLM's National Institute on Health:
Date: 3 Sep 2003
From: Dan Riss <dan_riss@nps.gov>
Subject: Household products database
The National Library of Medicine has a new web site
<URL:
http://householdproducts.nlm.nih.gov> that contains chemical data on household products. Over 4,000 products are listed. Each product listing, compiled from the MSDS, has information about the manufacturer, health effects, HMIS ratings for health, flammability and reactivity to help label decanted bottles, handling and disposal, and chemical ingredients.
Sure 'nuf, if you go to that site and click on "Products," there is tons of info on some of the major brands of auto detailing products -- chemical composition, MSDS facts, etc. Thanks to the work NIH has done, even for products that do not share MSDSs, you can get some info about their chemical components.
Though I'm no chemist, the preliminary searching I have done leads me to believe this could help some of us figure out which products actually have petroleum distillates, which have carnauba, etc. I'm probably not smart enough to really understand all that's in this online database, but I hope some of you will find it useful.