If we consider the whole
life cycle of a garment made from wool there are various points we
can make as to whether it is bad for the environment. Picking you way
through online resources is tricky. Many people have an angle. Vegans
are dogmatcicaly anything anything to do with animals, whilst many
information sources are sponsored by the wool industry. I have tried to
pick my way through. When reading up on this it is clear that many
authors do not stick to one country. For example export of live sheep,
may be common in Australia, but not so much in the UK.
Growing of Wool & Grazing of Sheep - Conclusion: Quite Bad
If we consider that wool grows on sheep there are two angles to view
this: If the sheep kept specifically for wool. Or is the wool
effectively a by-product of growing sheep for meat? Typically a breeding
flow of sheep would be kept for lambing, and these
ewes are kept year
after year to give a lamb or two every spring. They are also sheared
once a year.
Lamb (the meat of a sheep) is one of the most
carbon intensive
meats you can eat. But is wool a bi-product that would otherwise be
wasted? Or is it the other way around, wool demand drives meat
production. . . if the meat were a bi-product of wool I think it would
be some what less expensive. As it is lamb is one of the most expensive
meats you can buy.
Grazing of sheep can and does cause problems. Sheep are often kept on
"poor" land. Poor for the farmer, but perhaps good for nature. Sheep can
therefore damage sites such as moorland, and other "wild areas". The
thing to remember is that is crowded European countries there is very
little "wild" all but ancient woodlands have had some anthropogenic
influence.
Carbon Foot Print of Wool Compared to Other Fabrics - Conclusion: We Don't
Know
The single most pressing challenge facing people on this planet is climate
change. So how much CO2 does wool production create? Well estimates vary by a
large amount! There are not many studies available, that give value.
So deepening which value you use from above wool is twice as bad as
artificial fibers and cotton . . . . or about the same. . . or about 5
times worse than cotton. It is clear we need more carbon foot printing of wool,
before we can be clear on its true impact.
Wool in Use - Quite Bad
I have several cotton and acrylic jumpers that I hate which have lasted
forever, I still have a rugby shirt from school which is 20 years old, and still
strong as ever. My oldest wool jumper that I regularly wear is perhaps 3 years
old. Wool is not as durable as cotton or synthetic fibers. It shrink when you
wash it incorrectly, sometimes it shrinks even when it is washed at the correct
temperature. It shrinks when you put it in a tumble drier.
Over time wool degrades and the fibers are prone to breaking, it is also
prone to bobbling. I like old stuff, holes and bobbles rock, but many do not and
so the life span of their jumper is short.
In the fashion scene this matters little many will swap clothes before they
are worn out. But for practical work wear and the likes wool may not last as
well.
The Washing of Wool - Good
Micro plastics, were banded in shampoos some time ago, but we dump tons of
these in the ocean every year . . how? We when we wash our clothes the fibres
get washed from the clothing and then in to sewers and then in to rivers and
then the sea. Synthetic fibers will not degrade for many years, but wool
being made keratin will degrade much quicker.
Disposal of Wool - Depends
The fact that wool degrades is a bonus when it comes to disposal you could
even throw your old jumper on the compost heap. It does not get a lot more
sustainable than that! However, how many people will compost their jumper? Not
many, so in landfill your jumper will degrade and become methane. Sometimes this
is recovered for energy generation, other times not.
Is Wool Bad for the Environment? - Conclusions
Whilst wool has some advantages in terms of disposal and laundry impacts over
synthetics, it is clear that it does not stack up very well against cotton, and
other natural fibers such as hemp. I wrote this piece because I am in the market
for a jumper and wanted to make a review of available information. My primary
concern is global warming ergo carbon footprint of fabric choices, it is clear
that wool not only has a high or comparable carbon footprint to synthetics, but
will not last as long either, and for me this means that environmentally wool is
not a good choice.
