Million fibres produced by a clothes wash
A SINGLE clothes wash creates millions of plastic fibres which threaten our oceans, a study has found.
Scientists say people are producing plastic ‘microfibre’ waste from their fleeces and polyester clothing.
Plastic fibres from household laundry have been found in our food, from blue mussels to table salt and honey.
Experts say up to 300 fibres per litre escape in the waste water from family washing machines and that synthetic clothing is 16 times more damaging for the environment than microbeads.
Now a study by the Italian National Research Council has found that just one 5kg (11lbs) load of washing can create 6million to 17.7million plastic microfibres. Researchers say this can be cut by almost a third using fabric softener, which reduces the friction between fibres, but Greenpeace has warned this carries harmful chemicals into our waterways.
Part of the solution, the new study suggests, is to use liquid detergents which cause less friction and break off fewer fibres, and to put on shorter washes at lower temperatures.
Published in the journal Environmental Pollution, the study states: ‘The release of microplastics from synthetic clothes is caused by the mechanical and chemical stresses that fabrics undergo during a washing process in a laundry machine.
‘Due to their dimensions, a majority of released microfibres cannot be blocked by wastewater treatment plants, reaching in this way seas and oceans.’
The scientists carried out washing experiments on double-knit polyester used in jumpers, plain-weave polyester and polypropylene – used in outdoor clothing and thermal underwear.
Washing them with water alone produced an average of 162 fibres per gram of fabric, but that leapt to 1,273 fibres per gram using liquid detergent.
The findings suggest the environmentally conscious should use liquid instead of washing powder, however, as powder produced a massive 3,538 fibres per gram. Inorganic compounds in the powder which do not dissolve in water are believed to cause friction in clothing which causes fibres to break away.
A report released last month by fashion designer Stella McCartney and yachtswoman Dame Ellen McArthur said half a million tonnes of plastic microfibres a year contribute to ocean pollution – 16 times more than the plastic microbeads from cosmetics.
And the problem is getting worse, as cheap synthetic fabrics become ever more popular worldwide.
The Italian researchers found the way we wash our clothes can make a difference, stating: ‘The obtained results indicate that higher temperature, washing time and mechanical action produced an increase of microplastics release, even if the recorded differences were not very significant.’
Up to 30 per cent of fibres released by washing machines are believed to escape, potentially making their way to waterways.
Others trapped in sludge within sewage works can end up draining into water after being spread on farmland.
Campaigners have called for people to wear clothes for longer periods and use recycled fabrics.
‘Reaching the seas and oceans’