How Can Washing Clothes Help Cut Down Our Impact on the Climate?

World Changing Ideas

We’ve talked about oceans and plastic pollution before but today we’re going to explore an unlikely connection between those two topics, and something that often gets overlooked: laundry. It might seem like a strange link to climate change because, you know, who really cares about laundry? But about 50 percent of the total greenhouse gas emitted over the course of a life of a tee shirt, for example, comes from the laundry room. The vast majority of that is simply heating water to wash in hot. Hanesbrands Chief Sustainability Officer Chris Fox explains how the underwear giant has paired up with Tide to encourage people to wash with cold water. Then Dr. Andrea Huvard of California Lutheran University delves into the impact that laundry has on our sea life, specifically from the microfibers released.

Resources:

https://www.greenmatters.com/p/what-are-microfibers

https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2020-07/documents/article_2_microfibers.pdf