With the ever-increasing restrictions on sodium hypochlorite (i.e., chlorine bleach) in many parts of the world, especially Europe, a new class of bleaching agents, called peracids, has found its way into several markets.  One such market is the laundry industry, where peracids are used as bleaches and, even more commonly, as sanitizing agents in the highly regulated European laundry industry.  In the United States, while peracids have been used in the food processing industry for many years to sanitize the handling equipment, laundry applications are just now being explored.
 
What are peracids and how do they work? ...