In article , Baz wrote:
I was wondering, instead of wasting gas and electricity to sterilize the
jars, if citric acid and sodium bisulphite(as in winemaking sterilization)
would do the trick.
I do bottle some things when I have the oven on and cooking.

No, they wouldn't. Not even remotely.

That combination kills things like acetobacter, lactobacter etc.,
few of which sporulate. If you are going to store non-acid foods
anaerobically, you need to either kill some very tough spores or
prevent them from growing. That is why salting, smoking etc. were
and are used to preserve such foods.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.