Red Tag, Green Tag: Materials to Look Out for When Buying New

By Katie McKenzie 

As a part of the global environmental push, ‘green’ or ‘eco-friendly’ lines are all the rage across fast fashion brands at the moment, from Zara’s JOIN LIFE collection to H&M’s Conscious Choice range. But the fashion industry is notorious for greenwashing, so never trust your favourite fashion brand's new ‘sustainable’ or ‘ethical’ line until you’ve done your research! Most of them have a fair few ‘red flag’ fabrics listed on the tags of their products despite their happy eco-conscious marketing. 70% of the environmental impact of clothes is in their materials, so a little insight into your fabrics can keep your closet eco-friendly.

Red Tags

Nylon & Polyester

• Made from petrochemicals (large group of chemicals derived from natural gas and petroleum) which are highly emitting and can harm workers as well as the planet.
• Non-biodegradable; they can take anywhere between 20 to 200 years to break down if put into landfill.
• Manufacturing nylon creates nitrous oxide which can be 310 times more damaging than carbon dioxide.
• Polyester manufacturing uses incredibly large amounts of water, which, on a larger scale, can reduce access to clean water. The excess is usually filled with chemicals harming plants, animals, and humans.
• Both manufacturing processes are also very energy-intensive.

Rayon/Viscose

• Artificial fibre made from wood pulp that often appears in fashion brands' ‘sustainable’ lines; it is biodegradable and non-toxic, but the way its manufactured can cause harm to people and planet.
• Requires forests to be cleared and/or farmers to be displaced to make way for wood pulp plantations.
• Deforestation also leads to animals being displaced from their natural habitats.
• Involves a highly intensive chemical process which can release dangerous chemicals into surrounding air and water leading to health issues for both workers and local communities.

Cotton (Conventional)

• Most pesticide-intensive crop in the world.
• Takes up land that is needed to grow food for local communities.
• It is estimated that over 20,000 litres of water are required to produce just one cotton T-shirt and a pair of jeans, the excess of which is polluted with chemicals and dyes.
• Hazardous materials used in the cotton process are expensive to dispose and therefore often end up polluting nearby rivers so that the resulting products can remain cheap.

Animal-Derived Materials (Wool, Leather & Fur)

• Can have huge methane outputs; the livestock industry is responsible for around 14.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions.
• Extinction Rebellion states that one billion animals are killed for leather each year.
• 85% of global leather is tanned with chromium – a toxic substance that leaves workers with skin cancer and other skin conditions.

So these are a few of the worst contenders, but which materials get the tick of approval?

Green Tags

Organic or Recycled Cotton

• Organic cotton is grown without harmful pesticides and the dangerous chemicals used in conventional cotton.
• Recycled cotton is the most sustainable way to wear cotton, as it is both post-industrial and post-consumer waste.

Organic Hemp

• Plant itself returns 60-70% of nutrients to the soil it lives in.
• Hemp is a resistant crop and uses minimal amounts of water – up to 4x less than cotton!
• Hemp is naturally organic and therefore no herbicides or pesticides are involved.
• Every single part of a hemp plant can be used for many different things – so there is no waste left behind.
• From fine quality paper to trendy ‘superfood’, it has a variety of uses.
• Hemp has great yield and per acre produces up to 250% more fibre than cotton and up to 600% more fibre than flax which is used to make linen.
• Hemp is carbon positive and can trap 230% more carbon per year than fast-growing Eucalypt trees.

Organic Linen

• Produced from the plant flax which requires little water and few to no pesticides.
• Completely biodegradable when not dyed.
• Mechanically intensive, so does produce some emissions but overall way less than materials on the ‘red tag’ list.
• Flax is easy to come by and is an excellent option for local production.

Tencel

• Tencel is a pretty new fabric, and like rayon is made from wood pulp – but unlike Rayon the process for creating Tencel was designed specifically to reduce environmental impact.
• Tencel is biodegradable.
• Tencel’s production uses only one-third of the water that is needed to produce rayon.
• Over 99% of the water and solvents used can be recycled – meaning there is no need for new solvents, significantly reducing the risk of releasing dangerous chemicals into the environment, plus, the solvents used in Tencel production are non-toxic.
• Tencel is a bit pricier than other materials, and it’s not quite mainstream yet. But it’s out there and definitely one to look for!

Recycled Polyester (rPET)

• This material is a great solution to plastic pollution issues – it takes plastic waste that would’ve otherwise ended up in landfill and creates a whole new raw material.
• This recycled version is much more sustainable than conventional polyester as it skips the energy-intensive oil extraction process, significantly reducing the emissions of production; it also uses 35% less water than the original.
• An issue with recycled polyester is that, like conventional polyester, it does release microplastic during washing; however, washing it less can help to prevent that risk.

It’s great that there are more and more materials out there that are not harming people and planet, but there's still a long way to go, and a large part of that way will be paved by consumer education.

If you’re going to buy new, always ensure you examine your labels; if you see a ‘green tag' material, then great, but be sure to check out all the materials involved. Always consider your percentages before you weigh whether it’s worth it.