• Question: floor cleaners are alkaline but most have lemon fragrances and essence, does this make them netural in the PH scale?

    Asked by zoedel to Hywel, Joseph, Patience, Poonam, Rachael on 24 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Joseph Cook

      Joseph Cook answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      Lemon fragrance is probably not acidic, it’s other components of the lemon that are acidic. So the fragrance won’t affect the pH.

    • Photo: Poonam Kaushik

      Poonam Kaushik answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      lemon is acidic but its fragrance (basically chemical limonene) is not acidic and is very strong (means small amounts will be sufficient to do the job)! they r added as additives not as main cleaning component. So they do not undergo neutralization reaction!

      Brilliant Thought of urs! I am impressed

    • Photo: Dr Hywel Jones

      Dr Hywel Jones answered on 24 Jun 2010:

      The smell of lemon does not mean that the liquid itself has to contain lots of lemon juice (which you are correct in assuming is acidic). The chemical companies use something that smells like lemon andis based on the same chemicals that the lemon gives off as a smell but it is not there in high enough quantities to off set the alkalinity. For example, you could rub a lemon on your hands and they would smell like lemons for ages but that doesn’t mean they would be very acidic.

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