Microfibers
- Mar 12, 2019
- 2 min read
Microfibers is another issue that we are facing today, and you may be thinking if this is similar to micro plastics? The answer is yes, but microfibers are tiny fibrous pieces of plastic that come off our clothing when we wash them. To understand how this is a problem we have to go back to the 1940’s when synthetic clothing was becoming popular. Clothing made out of plastic material was cheaper, light weight, comfortable to wear and more versatile.
When we wash our clothing that’s made out of synthetic material small plastic fiber pieces fall off, and where do you think they end up? Yup, you guessed it-in our water. These microfiber pieces are so small that microorganisms are eating them. These toxic plastic pieces can be very harmful to all wildlife. Now that microfibers are a part of the food chain they have been found in so many other animals. Eventually, we will be finding microfibers in ourselves.
Making clothing out of plastic may seem like it’s a good solution to reuse materials, but in the end it’s just causing another issue. So how can we do to help reduce our impact? Well we can start off by reducing how much we purchase. America loves shopping and is spending 20% more on clothing than in the year of 2000.
Buy Less: The less clothing we buy, the less we’ll need to wash and less waste.
Avoid Purchasing Synthetic Fabrics: We could also avoid purchasing plastic based fabrics- this would be a very expensive solution that everyone will not be able to do. Clothing that’s made from cotton, wool or silk are typically more expensive. Synthetic fabrics like rayon, nylon, polyester and acrylic are much cheaper.
Wash when only necessary: Many clothes can be worn more than once.
Buy a washing bag: There are special bags that are made to catch any microfibers that come off our clothing. You simply put your clothing in the bag and put the bag in the wash machine. Check out these wash bags.
Put a lint catcher on your wash machine: There are also lint filters that can be purchased and put on your washing machine drain to catch the microfibers. Check out these filters.
Additional Information on how to reduce microfiber pollution:
Additional Video:
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