Microplastics and Your Clothes!

When you put your clothes in the washing machine you're probably not thinking about pollution. You're more worried about getting a stain out or freshening up your load of laundry. With every wash, tiny plastic particles, called microplastics, are released from our clothing items, polluting the water and harming the environment. 

Most clothes are made from synthetic fibers, which includes materials like polyester, nylon and acrylic. Unlike fibers like cotton or wool, synthetic materials don't break down on their own. When you wash them, friction causes fibers to shed off the item of clothing. As a result, microplastics end up in wastewater treatment plants that are not equipped to filter out these particles. Consequently, the microplastics coming off our clothes flow into rivers, lakes and eventually the ocean, polluting important ecosystems.

Once in the ocean, microplastics don't just disappear. Marine life, like fish, shellfish, and plankton, can mistake the particles for food, shortening their lifecycles and impacting the health of different ecosystems. Over time, these plastics move up the food chain, ending up in the fish and seafood that is caught and sold in grocery stores and marketed to consumers. What starts in our washing machines can end up on our plates.

The fast fashion industry has magnified this issue. Clothing items made to keep up with ever changing trend cycles are made mainly from polyester because it's cheap and makes producing large quantities easy. As people continuously wash their clothes, more microfibers are released into the environment. While the fashion industry is already known for causing carbon emissions and textile waste, microplastic pollution is a problem that's not as visible.

Making small changes in how we choose to consume clothing, such as checking clothing labels and choosing  clothing made from natural fibers, can help reduce microfiber shedding. Microplastic pollution reminds us that fashion's environmental impact is not about what we throw away. It's also about what we throw in our washing machines. Our clothes may feel soft and harmless, but many are made of plastic, and that plastic doesn't just disappear.