The Gussy Owl on Old Clothing

Let me start off by telling you a little fact. Did you know the average American disposes 68 pounds of clothing a year- as of today, May 16th, there are 315,866,240 people in the United States. Lets do some simple math: 68 x 315,866,240= 21,478,904,320 pounds of disposed clothing each and every year.

This doesn't even include the clothing we are re-using, donating or handing down.
Pretty daunting, huh?

People don't think of their clothing being an environmental risk- they couldn't be more wrong!

Different fabrics have different impacts, depending on what they’re made of:
Courtesy of Green Choices
Nylon and Polyester:
They are synthetic material and are NON-biodegradable. Nylon is 310 times stronger than carbon dioxide.

Rayon:
Another synthetic material that was created from wood pulp. Sounds green, right? Well, the wood pulp needs to be treated with hazardous chemicals such as sulphuric avid to be created.

Cotton:
Did you know cotton is the most pesticide intensive crop in the world? These pesticides injure and kill many people every year. It also takes up a large proportion of agricultural land, much of which is needed by local people to grow their own food. Herbicides, and also the chemical defoliants which are sometimes used to aid mechanical cotton harvesting, add to the toll on both the environment and human health. These chemicals typically remain in the fabric after finishing, and are released during the lifetime of the garments. The development of genetically modified cotton adds environmental problems at another level. Organic cotton is quite another matter.

We need to all try to obtain at least 25% of our clothing second-hand or upcycle our current clothing into something further useful. I will be honest, I didn't realize the impact on our clothing. I thought it would just decompose and it would reincarnate into another shirt or pair of pants!