Basically the title. Why do we use baking soda for so many cleaning tasks? What about it makes it the best for cleaning?
In: 18
Baking soda (bicarbonate) is neat, and pretty rare among common chemicals in that it’s “amphoteric” which is just fancy talk for it can act as an acid OR a base. It’s happy accepting or losing a proton (which is what bases and acids do, respectively). That means:
With acids, it acts like a base and neutralizes it.
With bases, it acts like an acid and neutralizes it!
Plus it’s non-toxic.
Plus it’s gritty and abrasive so it does good physical scrubbing if you make a paste.
Plus it’s easily water-soluble so you can easily make cleaning solutions. But being able to neutralize acids AND bases is the big one.
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