The real cost of your clothes

Sarah Young

Boxy leather jackets and breezy cotton dresses are mainstays in many of our wardrobes but do we really know just how much our favourite fashion pieces are affecting the environment? An industry that thrives on providing consumers with the latest trends, fashion’s rapid turnover means that each year we consume approximately 80bn pieces of clothing — a volume which is inevitably putting strain on the planet.

According to Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP) — a charity that works with governments, businesses and communities to improve resource efficiency — approximately £140m worth of clothing goes into landfill each year. 

Alice Wilby, a sustainable fashion consultant and spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion — a British campaign group demanding governments take urgent action on climate change — says that this kind of misuse results in “wasting perfectly usable textiles, slowly leaking toxins into the earth and microfibres into the waterways” and contributes to methane emissions. And that’s not all. By 2050 it is anticipated the fashion industry will use up 25 per cent of the world’s carbon budget, making it one of the most polluting industries second only to oil.

So, what can we, as consumers, do to change this?

To help you minimise your impact on the environment, we’ve put together a list of the best and worst fabrics for the environment with the help of a number of industry experts.

While cotton is a natural fibre that can biodegrade at the end of its life, it is also one of the most environmentally demanding crops. Wilby says cotton is “very water intensive to cultivate and process”, taking between 10,000 and 20,000 gallons of water to make a single pair of jeans and up to 3,000 to make a T-shirt.  She says cotton farming also uses high levels of pesticides and toxic chemicals that seep into the earth and water supplies.

Laura Balmond, project manager of Make Fashion Circular at environmental charity the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (EMF), states that synthetic fabrics are usually produced from oil and account for 63 per cent of the material input for textiles production. The most common materials in this sector are polyester (55 per cent), followed by nylon (five per cent), and acrylic (two per cent). 

While plastic-based fibres do not require agricultural land and use little water in production and processing, they impact the environment in other ways. Not only are synthetics not biodegradable, they all rely on the petrochemical industries for raw material, meaning this fashion industry staple is dependent on fossil fuel extraction.

According to Balmond, protein-based fibres like wool account for less than two per cent of all fibres used and can be biodegraded. However, materials like leather are responsible for huge methane outputs. Extinction Rebellion states that one billion animals are killed for leather every year while 85 per cent of the world’s leather is tanned with chromium, an extremely toxic substance that often leaves tannery workers with cancer. 

Balmond adds that toxic chemicals are often used to preserve wool and fur which, if poorly managed or simply discharged, can pollute the waterways, causing devastating pollution and further affecting the health of communities living along the banks.

The best fabrics for the environment are recycled, man-made cellulose and bast fibres. There are many ways in which we can all improve the sustainability rating of our own wardrobes. Here are some tips from our experts:

Wear more, waste less: Next time you want to buy something, ask yourself: how many times would I wear this? According to Fashion For Good, by wearing your clothes for an extra nine months, you can reduce waste and water usage by 20-30 per cent.

Quick, cool washes: Washing clothes with cold water on a quick cycle uses half the energy of washing warm. One cold load per week for a year can save the carbon equivalent of driving 123km.

Care for clothes: Caring for your clothes throughout their time with you will keep them lasting longer.

Recycle: You should never throw any item of unwanted clothing into the bin. “No matter how old, how threadbare or how unloved all textiles can either be reused or recycled and have a potential second life after you’ve finished with it,” Maddox says.   — The Independent