We need a solution to our obsession with clothes made from plastic
January 3, 2025 5:30 PM Subscribe
We need a solution to our obsession with clothes made from plastic. Synthetic textiles were once hailed as the future of fashion. Now, we all have to reckon with the consequences.
All it takes is a glance at a clothing label to see the scale of our obsession with plastic.
Commonly used textiles like polyester, acrylic, nylon and elastane are made by burning fossil fuels to create a type of plastic called polyethylene terephthalate (PET).
Other recognisable fibres like viscose/rayon, modal and bamboo are known as semi-synthetic, as they're derived from natural materials that have been chemically broken down and reconstituted.
"We estimate around 62 per cent of the clothes in most people's wardrobe is made up of plastic, either pure polyester garments or some kind of blend," says Tamzin Rollason, a lecturer at RMIT's School of Fashion and Textiles.
"They kind of sneak into our wardrobes, often without people really realising it," she tells ABC Radio National's Blueprint For Living.
There are plenty of reasons why the clothing industry relies so heavily on synthetic textiles. They tend to be durable, quick-drying and wrinkle-free, and are often used to create stretch in garments like jeans or activewear.
They're also much cheaper and more available than natural materials like cotton, wool or silk.
According to The Australia Institute, polyester accounts for over half of the clothing sold in Australia.
In a report on textile waste in May 2024, the research institute warned that, "given how readily these plastic clothes are disposed, textiles are at risk of becoming the new single-use plastic".
All it takes is a glance at a clothing label to see the scale of our obsession with plastic.
Commonly used textiles like polyester, acrylic, nylon and elastane are made by burning fossil fuels to create a type of plastic called polyethylene terephthalate (PET).
Other recognisable fibres like viscose/rayon, modal and bamboo are known as semi-synthetic, as they're derived from natural materials that have been chemically broken down and reconstituted.
"We estimate around 62 per cent of the clothes in most people's wardrobe is made up of plastic, either pure polyester garments or some kind of blend," says Tamzin Rollason, a lecturer at RMIT's School of Fashion and Textiles.
"They kind of sneak into our wardrobes, often without people really realising it," she tells ABC Radio National's Blueprint For Living.
There are plenty of reasons why the clothing industry relies so heavily on synthetic textiles. They tend to be durable, quick-drying and wrinkle-free, and are often used to create stretch in garments like jeans or activewear.
They're also much cheaper and more available than natural materials like cotton, wool or silk.
According to The Australia Institute, polyester accounts for over half of the clothing sold in Australia.
In a report on textile waste in May 2024, the research institute warned that, "given how readily these plastic clothes are disposed, textiles are at risk of becoming the new single-use plastic".
And, of course, the wear and tear on the synthetic fibers in clothing is responsible for a significant fraction of the microplastics in the oceans, about 35% according to estimates.
posted by notoriety public at 6:00 PM on January 3 [12 favorites]
posted by notoriety public at 6:00 PM on January 3 [12 favorites]
This issue is near and dear to my heart, as a former chemist and a person who wore all synthetic until 1 year ago and a person who advocated concerting to food acreage all the land dedicated to fiber growing, the issue of plastic toxicity is heartbreaking. (The article only pictures it as oil use and waste, which are also a big problem).
If we made durable cloths and stopped our insatiable peacock feather conspicous consumption race to annihilation, we wouldn't have this problem. But like so many things, the economy demands we self-destruct. Sports cars and big steaks and performance wear and fast fashion we are being sold our own collective doom.
That's because the production of natural fibres, like wool, cotton and linen, requires land, animals, water and people to process them. And we just don't have enough of those resources to produce enough natural fibres to meet the demand for fashion as it stands at the moment."
Bollocks.
Price and demand management.
Many environmental problems are : we don't want to charge people the full price because the market and our cut of it would be smaller.
Many other environmental problems are: it turns out this thing we didnt pre-test is the new smoking - bad for you, bad for everyone, but already an entrenched habit.
I don't know the total score but the precautionary principle would have saved so many millions of lives, and it moderately restrains the line-go-up crowd, so of course, we are left with voluntariy consumer awareness/choice and hope tech invents a no-side effect solution.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 6:02 PM on January 3 [9 favorites]
If we made durable cloths and stopped our insatiable peacock feather conspicous consumption race to annihilation, we wouldn't have this problem. But like so many things, the economy demands we self-destruct. Sports cars and big steaks and performance wear and fast fashion we are being sold our own collective doom.
That's because the production of natural fibres, like wool, cotton and linen, requires land, animals, water and people to process them. And we just don't have enough of those resources to produce enough natural fibres to meet the demand for fashion as it stands at the moment."
Bollocks.
Price and demand management.
Many environmental problems are : we don't want to charge people the full price because the market and our cut of it would be smaller.
Many other environmental problems are: it turns out this thing we didnt pre-test is the new smoking - bad for you, bad for everyone, but already an entrenched habit.
I don't know the total score but the precautionary principle would have saved so many millions of lives, and it moderately restrains the line-go-up crowd, so of course, we are left with voluntariy consumer awareness/choice and hope tech invents a no-side effect solution.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 6:02 PM on January 3 [9 favorites]
I think it’s a false dichotomy to say there isn’t enough wool at current demand. If I had solid wool clothing I wouldn’t go through clothing so often and could buy less.
posted by corb at 6:04 PM on January 3 [13 favorites]
posted by corb at 6:04 PM on January 3 [13 favorites]
Check out the closet sizes in old homes. We lived quite well without fast fashion. I think marketing and western culture are especially abusive of women in this regard. There was a male broadcaster who wore the same outfit everyday for a year without public pushback, while every woman in media is deluged with advice and criticism about their look.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 6:06 PM on January 3 [16 favorites]
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 6:06 PM on January 3 [16 favorites]
"Plastic Bag Found at the Bottom of World’s Deepest Ocean Trench"
I think this was when I crossed the Despair Event Horizon on environmental issues.
posted by Lemkin at 6:20 PM on January 3 [11 favorites]
I think this was when I crossed the Despair Event Horizon on environmental issues.
posted by Lemkin at 6:20 PM on January 3 [11 favorites]
We Dress Like Sexy Idiots (Fast Fashion Is Hot Garbage --Climate Town with Rollie Williams).
posted by kiblinger at 6:22 PM on January 3 [3 favorites]
posted by kiblinger at 6:22 PM on January 3 [3 favorites]
I remember when they broke the recycling of denim into dollar bills by making jeans part plastic. Now a lot of countries have plastic money!
posted by srboisvert at 6:27 PM on January 3
posted by srboisvert at 6:27 PM on January 3
Shearing a sheep can cost more than the fleece sells for.
posted by Mitheral at 7:03 PM on January 3 [6 favorites]
No one shears sheep to sell the wool any more, explains James Edwards, a new-entrant tenant farmer with a flock of more than 1,200 ewesSo herders are switching to sheep that naturally shed their fleece.
posted by Mitheral at 7:03 PM on January 3 [6 favorites]
Commonly used textiles like polyester, acrylic, nylon and elastane are made by burning fossil fuels to create a type of plastic called polyethylene terephthalate (PET).
Is this true? I can't find any evidence that the production is polyester or spandex involves burning fisk fuels. Crude oil derived, sure (though not essential for polyester, in practice that is how it is effectively always done) but not the product of burning fossil fuels. The purge factions will be burnt, sure, but the burning is not part of the plastic production process, is it?
posted by Dysk at 7:09 PM on January 3 [5 favorites]
Is this true? I can't find any evidence that the production is polyester or spandex involves burning fisk fuels. Crude oil derived, sure (though not essential for polyester, in practice that is how it is effectively always done) but not the product of burning fossil fuels. The purge factions will be burnt, sure, but the burning is not part of the plastic production process, is it?
posted by Dysk at 7:09 PM on January 3 [5 favorites]
It is confusing that wool is so expensive to buy but I’ve heard from sheep farmers on both US coasts that they can’t sell fleeces even from breeds that were developed as wool breeds. Lots of the mills are gone, of course, but lots of cheap things get shipped around the world. Especially fabric! It’s been an export good for 20,000 years! It’s a puzzle.
posted by clew at 10:51 PM on January 3 [8 favorites]
posted by clew at 10:51 PM on January 3 [8 favorites]
Right now I am wearing a pair of black cotton shorts that were old when my mother poured bleach on them in 1996 and made a spotty mess. Even the bleached spots haven't broken down into holes and they've been washed probably a couple of hundred times. Now that's lasting! I don't buy polyester clothes. And though I've been wearing these shorts for over 35 years, the environment is still going to shit.
posted by a humble nudibranch at 11:04 PM on January 3 [4 favorites]
posted by a humble nudibranch at 11:04 PM on January 3 [4 favorites]
Wool is amazing. It doesn’t get smelly so you don’t have to wash it so much so it lasts forever (close enough, anyway). Did I mention it doesn’t get smelly? I have 100% wool long underwear made by Icebreaker, and also “HeatTech” synthetic long underwear from Uniqlo. The synthetic ones need to be washed after one wear, and after a year the pits are just permanently smelly, even after a wash. I’ve heard this is because volatile body odors bind to synthetics.
The wool ones, though, can go for nearly 10 wears before they even start to smell — and I wear them running!
I knit and I’ve found that linen and linen/silk blend yarn makes great cool (as in temperature, but they also look nice) summer shirts, so I have several that I’ve knitted over the years. Same deal, T-shirts with synthetic fibers get smelly pits after one wear, the linen and silk ones I can wear several times, and they’re more comfortable.
100% natural fiber clothing is more expensive, but considering how much less laundering they need and how long they last, I think in the long run they’re cheaper.
posted by antinomia at 11:48 PM on January 3 [17 favorites]
The wool ones, though, can go for nearly 10 wears before they even start to smell — and I wear them running!
I knit and I’ve found that linen and linen/silk blend yarn makes great cool (as in temperature, but they also look nice) summer shirts, so I have several that I’ve knitted over the years. Same deal, T-shirts with synthetic fibers get smelly pits after one wear, the linen and silk ones I can wear several times, and they’re more comfortable.
100% natural fiber clothing is more expensive, but considering how much less laundering they need and how long they last, I think in the long run they’re cheaper.
posted by antinomia at 11:48 PM on January 3 [17 favorites]
Plastics are downstream of oil. The only way to curtail their usage, in clothing or in anything, is to stop subsidizing and then stop producing oil.
posted by Grimp0teuthis at 12:11 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
posted by Grimp0teuthis at 12:11 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
Is this true? I can't find any evidence that the production is polyester or spandex involves burning fisk fuels
I thought that was just a poor attempt to describe the process of deriving petrochemicals. And hey, some are being burned (for energy) in that process.
posted by atoxyl at 12:19 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
I thought that was just a poor attempt to describe the process of deriving petrochemicals. And hey, some are being burned (for energy) in that process.
posted by atoxyl at 12:19 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
Now a lot of countries have plastic money!
I’ve always read that one reason is that it’s more durable, which raises a point also raised in the article - a lot of problems with synthetics are really problems stemming from the fact that since we can use them to make a bunch of cheap disposable shit, we do. But they’re not necessarily without redeeming qualities inherently.
posted by atoxyl at 12:24 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
I’ve always read that one reason is that it’s more durable, which raises a point also raised in the article - a lot of problems with synthetics are really problems stemming from the fact that since we can use them to make a bunch of cheap disposable shit, we do. But they’re not necessarily without redeeming qualities inherently.
posted by atoxyl at 12:24 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
Also, on a personal level, I'll second antinomia's endorsement of wool. It's amazing stuff that can have very, very different properties based on how it has been prepared.
- Merino wool is great for baselayers: it can be very thin, soft, breathable, and wicking, all while keeping you warm. These go on sale fairly regularly, so no need to pay retail prices. If you have a good layering setup, start off with mostly lighter-weight baselayers and go heavier-weight only if needed. A little goes a long way. I have had a good experience with Ridge Merino baselayers, but there are a million options.
- Wool flannels and fleeces can be quite soft and comfy as a midlayer. Higher-quality sweaters can be found in softer wool, too. Breathability is huge here, too -- you get a much wider range of temperatures and activity levels (compared to synthetics) before you need to add/remove layers. Zippers and buttons let you dump a little heat if you run to catch a bus or pop into a coffee shop, etc. Real wool fleece is expensive, but flannels are available at many prices and in vintage/thrift shops -- just be sure to get them on the heavier side and be sure to get wool (cotton flannel isn't even close!).
- Wool twills (e.g. gabardine, cavalry twill) can be woven tight enough to be an excellent shell against the wind, while remaining totally breathable and soft enough to wear against the skin. Wool tweeds are also often good for the same uses, but will trade away softness for durability and are often uncomfortable against the skin. Wool twills and tweeds will have a bit of water resistance, but AFAIK no wool can quite match synthetics in that department. There are attempts to improve this without relying on coatings, membranes, and other synthetics, such as Optim Wool, but I have no idea how effective these are. I'd love to know if anyone has run across a decent wool shell that will get me through 15 minutes of decent-but-not-heavy rain without wetting out completely.
Cheap wool tends to feel more scratchy, will pill more easily (but that can be shaved off), and will be less durable. Recycled wool is the same, because (I have read) the fibers are shorter. Military surplus wool will offer a lot of bang (warmth, durability) for your buck, but can be heavy and softness is often totally ignored. Look for twills if you can find them. Those brown WW2-era cowl-neck sweaters are very warm for their weight, but do not let them touch your skin, lol.
Wool is an excellent replacement for down or synthetic insulation. I use a wool duvet with a linen cover and it is fantastic, all the way through the spring.
posted by Grimp0teuthis at 1:08 AM on January 4 [21 favorites]
- Merino wool is great for baselayers: it can be very thin, soft, breathable, and wicking, all while keeping you warm. These go on sale fairly regularly, so no need to pay retail prices. If you have a good layering setup, start off with mostly lighter-weight baselayers and go heavier-weight only if needed. A little goes a long way. I have had a good experience with Ridge Merino baselayers, but there are a million options.
- Wool flannels and fleeces can be quite soft and comfy as a midlayer. Higher-quality sweaters can be found in softer wool, too. Breathability is huge here, too -- you get a much wider range of temperatures and activity levels (compared to synthetics) before you need to add/remove layers. Zippers and buttons let you dump a little heat if you run to catch a bus or pop into a coffee shop, etc. Real wool fleece is expensive, but flannels are available at many prices and in vintage/thrift shops -- just be sure to get them on the heavier side and be sure to get wool (cotton flannel isn't even close!).
- Wool twills (e.g. gabardine, cavalry twill) can be woven tight enough to be an excellent shell against the wind, while remaining totally breathable and soft enough to wear against the skin. Wool tweeds are also often good for the same uses, but will trade away softness for durability and are often uncomfortable against the skin. Wool twills and tweeds will have a bit of water resistance, but AFAIK no wool can quite match synthetics in that department. There are attempts to improve this without relying on coatings, membranes, and other synthetics, such as Optim Wool, but I have no idea how effective these are. I'd love to know if anyone has run across a decent wool shell that will get me through 15 minutes of decent-but-not-heavy rain without wetting out completely.
Cheap wool tends to feel more scratchy, will pill more easily (but that can be shaved off), and will be less durable. Recycled wool is the same, because (I have read) the fibers are shorter. Military surplus wool will offer a lot of bang (warmth, durability) for your buck, but can be heavy and softness is often totally ignored. Look for twills if you can find them. Those brown WW2-era cowl-neck sweaters are very warm for their weight, but do not let them touch your skin, lol.
Wool is an excellent replacement for down or synthetic insulation. I use a wool duvet with a linen cover and it is fantastic, all the way through the spring.
posted by Grimp0teuthis at 1:08 AM on January 4 [21 favorites]
Plastics are downstream of oil. The only way to curtail their usage, in clothing or in anything, is to stop subsidizing and then stop producing oil.
I don't dispute this, but I do dispute that plastics are made by burning fossil fuels.
I thought that was just a poor attempt to describe the process of deriving petrochemicals. And hey, some are being burned (for energy) in that process.
That's like saying wooden spoons are made by burning wood, because the lumber comes from a forestry operation that also produces firewood or a workshop that sells sawdust pellets as biofuel.
posted by Dysk at 1:38 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
I don't dispute this, but I do dispute that plastics are made by burning fossil fuels.
I thought that was just a poor attempt to describe the process of deriving petrochemicals. And hey, some are being burned (for energy) in that process.
That's like saying wooden spoons are made by burning wood, because the lumber comes from a forestry operation that also produces firewood or a workshop that sells sawdust pellets as biofuel.
posted by Dysk at 1:38 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
Yeah, a thing I’ve learned as a knitter: wool with short fibers, like merino, are great for softness. You can knit a scarf you’ll wear against your neck with short fiber wool yarn. Their drawback is that they wear out faster (short fibers escape the weave more easily). Long fibers add durability, with the drawback that they’re scratchier.
So it’s a balancing act. For things like scarves, go with short fiber for comfort, but for making durable socks you have to weigh how much scratchy stiffness you’re willing to endure.
posted by antinomia at 2:03 AM on January 4 [6 favorites]
So it’s a balancing act. For things like scarves, go with short fiber for comfort, but for making durable socks you have to weigh how much scratchy stiffness you’re willing to endure.
posted by antinomia at 2:03 AM on January 4 [6 favorites]
It doesn’t get smelly so you don’t have to wash it so much so it lasts forever (close enough, anyway). Did I mention it doesn’t get smelly?
Yeah right. Or to put it another way, if only! Once the pits on your wool base layer do get stinky, they're basically impossible to un-stink. (I'm still a fan of wool, but this no-smell claim seems to only apply to some people.)
posted by inexorably_forward at 2:08 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
Yeah right. Or to put it another way, if only! Once the pits on your wool base layer do get stinky, they're basically impossible to un-stink. (I'm still a fan of wool, but this no-smell claim seems to only apply to some people.)
posted by inexorably_forward at 2:08 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
Sheep farmer here, raising pedigree Shetlands for fleece quality. The garment wool industry is almost entirely captured by Australian Merinos these days, so they are profitable for wool production but your ordinary commercial breed sheep is not. Specialty pedigree breeds like my Shetlands are mildly profitable catering directly to handspinners and yarn outlets, but are not well served by the big wool auctions that the Merinos dominate.
What matters most for garment wool is a combination of micron, standard deviation, and crimp, plus staple length (and shearing quality -- a bad job shearing creates a lot of short bits where the shearer went over the same area twice). Low micron and low standard deviation makes it comfortable next to the skin. Good staple length and not too many short bits also helps, and it's the short bits that lead to pilling. Breed doesn't really matter aside from whether the breed is optimised for those qualities. Merino fleece can be 20 micron and soft or 30 micron and itchy depending on age and quality of the sheep.
Lots of good explanatory wool quality docs here if you want to geek out.
If fossil fuel fibre becomes unavailable/unprofitable then hopefully we'll see a wool renaissance. Cotton is also very dependent on fossil fuel fertiliser. Maybe a linen renaissance too -- I hear you can make it from nettles in which case I'll be all set.
posted by Rhedyn at 2:55 AM on January 4 [45 favorites]
What matters most for garment wool is a combination of micron, standard deviation, and crimp, plus staple length (and shearing quality -- a bad job shearing creates a lot of short bits where the shearer went over the same area twice). Low micron and low standard deviation makes it comfortable next to the skin. Good staple length and not too many short bits also helps, and it's the short bits that lead to pilling. Breed doesn't really matter aside from whether the breed is optimised for those qualities. Merino fleece can be 20 micron and soft or 30 micron and itchy depending on age and quality of the sheep.
Lots of good explanatory wool quality docs here if you want to geek out.
If fossil fuel fibre becomes unavailable/unprofitable then hopefully we'll see a wool renaissance. Cotton is also very dependent on fossil fuel fertiliser. Maybe a linen renaissance too -- I hear you can make it from nettles in which case I'll be all set.
posted by Rhedyn at 2:55 AM on January 4 [45 favorites]
I knit a lot of my own socks. 100 percent wool yarn disintegrates quickly (I tend to drag my feet), but add a little nylon to the blend and they hold up for years, get darned, and then last years more. What's the tradeoff?
posted by rikschell at 5:18 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
posted by rikschell at 5:18 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
Once the pits on your wool base layer do get stinky, they're basically impossible to un-stink. (I'm still a fan of wool, but this no-smell claim seems to only apply to some people.)This is interesting: I’m rarely accused of being odor free but the lightweight wool outdoor gear I bought in 2005 (I remember the year because I hadn’t seen it before and stocked up in New Zealand, right before it was broadly on the market in the US) hasn’t acquired any odor despite being used for backpacking trips, daily winter bike commuting, etc. I wonder if there’s some detail about how it’s processed which could explain such different experiences.
posted by adamsc at 5:22 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
rikschell, I wonder what you think of this discussion on making lasting wool socks? I haven't tried making socks myself so am curious. I do think there's a lot of Merino marketing wankery that is misleading, i.e. wool can hit 100% comfort factor (CF) at low 20s micron if the standard deviation is tight, so hyperfocusing on lowest possible micron is just making it fragile for little extra gain in comfort, and usually means short staple since fibre fineness and staple length tend to be inversely correlated. If I were doing socks I think I'd try for a mid-20s micron with a long staple.
posted by Rhedyn at 5:43 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
posted by Rhedyn at 5:43 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
Also to add, because I feel this discussion would be incomplete without mentioning it: traditional Merino sheep are horrific for welfare. They've been bred to have loose skin to create more surface area and thus more wool per sheep. This makes them harder to shear without nicks, and also extra vulnerable to fly strike (which you should not google while eating or if you ever want to eat rice again). To reduce the fly strike risk traditional Merino flocks in Australia are put through a horrible process called "mulesing" in which the skin on their bums is cut off and allowed to scar over. There is enough backlash about this that flocks are transitioning to tighter skinned Merinos that are not subjected to mulesing but I believe most of the flocks in Australia are still traditional. I personally would not ever buy Merino wool for this reason.
posted by Rhedyn at 5:59 AM on January 4 [9 favorites]
posted by Rhedyn at 5:59 AM on January 4 [9 favorites]
Once upon a time, several centuries ago, there was very roughly an equal population of sheep to people in England. And that meant, also very, very roughly, every person in England could have one new garment, or blanket, per year.
Of course a lot of the wool was used for other things, and they also created a lot of ramie from nettles, and linen from flax, and lightweight leather from all those sheep skins. So they didn't just each get one wool tunic per year, every year, in practice. But you still have a basic bit of math, that to provide a pretty basic amount of clothing, you need an awful lot of sheep.
Back in those days, a sizeable percent of the population spent the best part of their working hours working with textiles. Linen is extremely labour intensive to process and used to take a year of work to break the fibre down enough to make clothes out of it. Much of that work was passive retting of the flax stems. Wool was the fast fabric of the era. A team of workers could take a filthy fleece straight from the sheep, pick, wash, card or comb it and then start spinning it in a single day. If they worked fast you might even get some substandard but usable cloth in a mere week.
Since the production of clothing is so very, very labour intensive and complex, we naturally mechanized it. A huge number of our modern technologies are built on the foundation of textile technology. Vellum for the first hand copied books came from those sheep that we raised for wool. The Industrial Revolution is a story about people being disposed from the land so that the wealthy land owners could run more sheep, and the designing and power of the machines that could do the work of hundreds or thousands of people. Fulling machines, carding and combing machines, water and steam powered spinners, and power looms. The Americans here are probably familiar with the cotton gin, and how it revolutionized the cotton industry in the USA. Even computers are directly descended from the punch cards invented for jacquard weaving.
Behind all that technology was the fact that people needed clothing, and people had to spend hundreds of millions of hours producing it. The reason we switched to polyester is that it is much, much, much cheaper to produce than natural textiles. Wool and linen are luxury fabrics now for a reason.
If you look at the population of the entire world and think about the amount of fabric they need just to have a couple of minimal sets of work clothing it's a wicked problem. Our environment needs us to stop producing polyester. If we stop producing polyester then we need to replace it with some other fibre. We have 8 billion people that we need to clothe. But maybe it's not an insoluble problem. There are currently roughly 1 billion sheep in the world. We could perhaps manage to increase the number of sheep within 20 or 25 years. Where would we get the land to run 8 billion sheep?
The last time we decided to increase the number of sheep we were running we ended up with a vast outward migration of the people who were displaced. In some countries the inhabitants of the territory that became the sheep's grazing land weren't so much displaced as decimated. Finding pasture land would have to be the first step. If we even make the attempt it is going to be interesting. Pasture land needs to be irrigated - so not just any old land will do. You can't graze sheep in my local softwood forests. There is no forage. You need grass, and it needs to be good green, healthy moist grass. We are going to need to divert hundreds of millions of litres of water into keeping the extra seven billion sheep properly supplied. Cotton can need up to 20,000 liters of water per kilogram, where flax needs only about 400 liters for the same weight of fibre. But it takes 170,000 litres of water to produce just 1 kilogram of clean wool.
We need to reduce our dependence on plastic for our clothing - but my saying so, and anyone else saying so is like the mice, confidently solving their problems by deciding to put a bell on the cat.
We need a LOT of intelligent minds to work on this problem and we need to be prepared for extraordinary social changes as great as the changes of the Industrial Revolution. By maybe with computers and spreadsheets to help us communicate and coordinate and plan...?
posted by Jane the Brown at 6:02 AM on January 4 [19 favorites]
Of course a lot of the wool was used for other things, and they also created a lot of ramie from nettles, and linen from flax, and lightweight leather from all those sheep skins. So they didn't just each get one wool tunic per year, every year, in practice. But you still have a basic bit of math, that to provide a pretty basic amount of clothing, you need an awful lot of sheep.
Back in those days, a sizeable percent of the population spent the best part of their working hours working with textiles. Linen is extremely labour intensive to process and used to take a year of work to break the fibre down enough to make clothes out of it. Much of that work was passive retting of the flax stems. Wool was the fast fabric of the era. A team of workers could take a filthy fleece straight from the sheep, pick, wash, card or comb it and then start spinning it in a single day. If they worked fast you might even get some substandard but usable cloth in a mere week.
Since the production of clothing is so very, very labour intensive and complex, we naturally mechanized it. A huge number of our modern technologies are built on the foundation of textile technology. Vellum for the first hand copied books came from those sheep that we raised for wool. The Industrial Revolution is a story about people being disposed from the land so that the wealthy land owners could run more sheep, and the designing and power of the machines that could do the work of hundreds or thousands of people. Fulling machines, carding and combing machines, water and steam powered spinners, and power looms. The Americans here are probably familiar with the cotton gin, and how it revolutionized the cotton industry in the USA. Even computers are directly descended from the punch cards invented for jacquard weaving.
Behind all that technology was the fact that people needed clothing, and people had to spend hundreds of millions of hours producing it. The reason we switched to polyester is that it is much, much, much cheaper to produce than natural textiles. Wool and linen are luxury fabrics now for a reason.
If you look at the population of the entire world and think about the amount of fabric they need just to have a couple of minimal sets of work clothing it's a wicked problem. Our environment needs us to stop producing polyester. If we stop producing polyester then we need to replace it with some other fibre. We have 8 billion people that we need to clothe. But maybe it's not an insoluble problem. There are currently roughly 1 billion sheep in the world. We could perhaps manage to increase the number of sheep within 20 or 25 years. Where would we get the land to run 8 billion sheep?
The last time we decided to increase the number of sheep we were running we ended up with a vast outward migration of the people who were displaced. In some countries the inhabitants of the territory that became the sheep's grazing land weren't so much displaced as decimated. Finding pasture land would have to be the first step. If we even make the attempt it is going to be interesting. Pasture land needs to be irrigated - so not just any old land will do. You can't graze sheep in my local softwood forests. There is no forage. You need grass, and it needs to be good green, healthy moist grass. We are going to need to divert hundreds of millions of litres of water into keeping the extra seven billion sheep properly supplied. Cotton can need up to 20,000 liters of water per kilogram, where flax needs only about 400 liters for the same weight of fibre. But it takes 170,000 litres of water to produce just 1 kilogram of clean wool.
We need to reduce our dependence on plastic for our clothing - but my saying so, and anyone else saying so is like the mice, confidently solving their problems by deciding to put a bell on the cat.
We need a LOT of intelligent minds to work on this problem and we need to be prepared for extraordinary social changes as great as the changes of the Industrial Revolution. By maybe with computers and spreadsheets to help us communicate and coordinate and plan...?
posted by Jane the Brown at 6:02 AM on January 4 [19 favorites]
Sheep farmer here
This is why I love MetaFilter.
posted by Lemkin at 6:13 AM on January 4 [17 favorites]
This is why I love MetaFilter.
posted by Lemkin at 6:13 AM on January 4 [17 favorites]
Also, it takes 7,000 to 10,000 pounds of water to produce 1 pound of cotton.
posted by Lemkin at 6:15 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
posted by Lemkin at 6:15 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
Jane the Brown I agree with 80% of your above but I think the numbers are misleading, at least to the casual reader. 170,000 litres of water to produce 1kg of clean wool sounds bizarre to me, even here where all the water involved comes from it raining all the time I doubt that much was required for the 40-50kg of lightly dirty wool mine produce plus what it would take to scour that and produce approx 30kg of clean usable stuff.
There are a lot of different possible sources of plant and animal textiles. I certainly would not propose increasing the number of sheep, but I would propose shifting back toward dual purpose sheep breeds and treating wool as valuable again, for sheep kept on land that is naturally suited to growing grass, usually moderate altitude and high rainfall.
posted by Rhedyn at 6:18 AM on January 4 [8 favorites]
There are a lot of different possible sources of plant and animal textiles. I certainly would not propose increasing the number of sheep, but I would propose shifting back toward dual purpose sheep breeds and treating wool as valuable again, for sheep kept on land that is naturally suited to growing grass, usually moderate altitude and high rainfall.
posted by Rhedyn at 6:18 AM on January 4 [8 favorites]
Also I would note that we used to treat textiles as much more reusable. So the new jumper that the kid gets might be from the reuse of 80% of the yarn from a parent's worn out jumper, rather than from brand new yarn. Figuring out how to do that sort of thing again seems like it should be a big part of the solution.
posted by Rhedyn at 6:30 AM on January 4 [8 favorites]
posted by Rhedyn at 6:30 AM on January 4 [8 favorites]
Lemkin beat me to it, so I'll content myself with
I’m rarely accused of being odor free
posted by ginger.beef at 6:49 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
I’m rarely accused of being odor free
posted by ginger.beef at 6:49 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
> Where would we get the land to run 8 billion sheep?
Re-internalize the cost of beef!
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 6:59 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
Re-internalize the cost of beef!
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 6:59 AM on January 4 [4 favorites]
Rhedyn, I agree with you entirely. I grabbed some figures off the internet, because they are at least ballpark rough figures good enough to indicate the issue that you can't just run sheep anywhere, as the grass requires rain, but that flax requires less water than cotton, and much less water than wool to produce. A hundred litres of water is still just an estimated figure, which will be obscured by variations in local rainfall and the number of acres used for grazing or growing.
But I figured I was going on too long already, so I didn't enlarge on the idea of growing more flax, and the drawbacks, like that flax require prime farming land which may be critically needed for food crops, and it requires fertilizer - which is ammonium nitrate, produced using fossil fuels, making it greatly dependent on the same things as polyester - and that like cotton, it requires a lot of pesticide and anti fungal treatment which opens up its own issues... I think it was 2017 when there was a serious problem with rust destroying most of the flax crop... And this all before you get to the processing to turn the flax plant into linen. Many, many variables.
Farming is never, ever, ever simple. Never.
My feeling is that each individual area will have to assess what textile crops it can best support and go with that. I also think that projects to produce textile will have to range in size from someone keeping a backyard sheep or a backyard plot of cotton, to football clubs and airports offering a co-op sheep owning program, to large corporations managing to get a lock on an entire state's supply of water so that they can produce hundreds of tons of textile fibre at a profit. It's a wicked problem and far too complicated to know what will work and what won't, but the more things we try the more successes we will have.
posted by Jane the Brown at 7:15 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
But I figured I was going on too long already, so I didn't enlarge on the idea of growing more flax, and the drawbacks, like that flax require prime farming land which may be critically needed for food crops, and it requires fertilizer - which is ammonium nitrate, produced using fossil fuels, making it greatly dependent on the same things as polyester - and that like cotton, it requires a lot of pesticide and anti fungal treatment which opens up its own issues... I think it was 2017 when there was a serious problem with rust destroying most of the flax crop... And this all before you get to the processing to turn the flax plant into linen. Many, many variables.
Farming is never, ever, ever simple. Never.
My feeling is that each individual area will have to assess what textile crops it can best support and go with that. I also think that projects to produce textile will have to range in size from someone keeping a backyard sheep or a backyard plot of cotton, to football clubs and airports offering a co-op sheep owning program, to large corporations managing to get a lock on an entire state's supply of water so that they can produce hundreds of tons of textile fibre at a profit. It's a wicked problem and far too complicated to know what will work and what won't, but the more things we try the more successes we will have.
posted by Jane the Brown at 7:15 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
The other reason I am interested in keeping sheep is that grazing, if done properly, is how you produce topsoil, so that initially marginal pasture land eventually becomes suitable for cropland. Also sheep can produce fertilizer, which is going to be drastically needed when ammonium nitrate supplies become limited.
posted by Jane the Brown at 7:19 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
posted by Jane the Brown at 7:19 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
The other reason I am interested in keeping sheep is that grazing, if done properly, is how you produce topsoil, so that initially marginal pasture land eventually becomes suitable for cropland. Also sheep can produce fertilizer, which is going to be drastically needed when ammonium nitrate supplies become limited.
Mixed farming, in which fields are rotated between different crops and different grazing animals (cows followed by sheep is an ideal combination), offers tremendous advantages in reducing the need for pesticides, herbicides, parasite treatments and artificial fertilisers. But it doesn't lend itself to scale like monocrop farming, and it requires more human labour that is able-bodied enough to manage large animals. I've been seeing an increase in farmers near me looking for collaborative arrangements where one farm's animals travel to graze another farm's fields when it's the right animal type at the right time, so hopefully that trend will continue.
posted by Rhedyn at 7:35 AM on January 4 [9 favorites]
Mixed farming, in which fields are rotated between different crops and different grazing animals (cows followed by sheep is an ideal combination), offers tremendous advantages in reducing the need for pesticides, herbicides, parasite treatments and artificial fertilisers. But it doesn't lend itself to scale like monocrop farming, and it requires more human labour that is able-bodied enough to manage large animals. I've been seeing an increase in farmers near me looking for collaborative arrangements where one farm's animals travel to graze another farm's fields when it's the right animal type at the right time, so hopefully that trend will continue.
posted by Rhedyn at 7:35 AM on January 4 [9 favorites]
To me, there are two main problems here:
1) Fast Fashion: cheap stuff that isn't meant to last, whose design is intended to capture a brief fad, and is not necessarily made for practicality or longevity. So these articles get worn a few times, then discarded or passed on due to failing, fading, or simply because they're no longer au courant. All of which also means there's less of a used market for them, and they end up as garbage. This is a problem no matter what fabrics were used - synthetic or not.
2) Microplastics in the environment: synthetic fabrics shed synthetic microfibers, in use and particularly when they are washed. And unless the plastic was designed to deteriorate over time, the microfibers will be around for decades or more, working their way into the food chain. We've barely begun to understand this reality. Is it feasible to filter these particles out of the wash water at each machine? Can they be captured as part of our treatment of all wastewater?
I don't know the answers here, other than making sure that all externalities are priced into the products, and legislating the worst practices away. I'm about the opposite of a fast fashion person, but others aren't going to keep rocking the ancient cargo pants, faded tees and ratty outdoor wear that are my staples.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:55 AM on January 4 [6 favorites]
1) Fast Fashion: cheap stuff that isn't meant to last, whose design is intended to capture a brief fad, and is not necessarily made for practicality or longevity. So these articles get worn a few times, then discarded or passed on due to failing, fading, or simply because they're no longer au courant. All of which also means there's less of a used market for them, and they end up as garbage. This is a problem no matter what fabrics were used - synthetic or not.
2) Microplastics in the environment: synthetic fabrics shed synthetic microfibers, in use and particularly when they are washed. And unless the plastic was designed to deteriorate over time, the microfibers will be around for decades or more, working their way into the food chain. We've barely begun to understand this reality. Is it feasible to filter these particles out of the wash water at each machine? Can they be captured as part of our treatment of all wastewater?
I don't know the answers here, other than making sure that all externalities are priced into the products, and legislating the worst practices away. I'm about the opposite of a fast fashion person, but others aren't going to keep rocking the ancient cargo pants, faded tees and ratty outdoor wear that are my staples.
posted by Artful Codger at 7:55 AM on January 4 [6 favorites]
I live in sheep country, and one thing that's notable about it is that much of the land here is not much use for anything else other than sheep. We do get a lot of rain, but the land is generally precipitious in most places. Tractors would fall off, but sheep don't.
In the Industrial Revolution, this area was one of the richest places around because this is where all the mills were.
posted by HypotheticalWoman at 9:08 AM on January 4 [5 favorites]
In the Industrial Revolution, this area was one of the richest places around because this is where all the mills were.
posted by HypotheticalWoman at 9:08 AM on January 4 [5 favorites]
Hemp is another very interesting fabric that I know next to nothing about, but seems to be finding its way into more and more clothing. Would love for a knowledgeable Mefite to weigh in!
posted by Grimp0teuthis at 10:10 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
posted by Grimp0teuthis at 10:10 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
Would love for a knowledgeable Mefite to weigh in!
It not be me, but I will say a friend's father put in a crop of hemp, sort of a "give it a boo" decision, and it sure grows fast but from what she described it was tough to harvest
Again from what she described, the dad did not pursue farming hemp commercially mainly because of the investment in new equipment and I think he was already halfway to retiring. They sold their place last year, I will ask her what came of the whole thing (context: western Canada)
posted by ginger.beef at 10:59 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
It not be me, but I will say a friend's father put in a crop of hemp, sort of a "give it a boo" decision, and it sure grows fast but from what she described it was tough to harvest
Again from what she described, the dad did not pursue farming hemp commercially mainly because of the investment in new equipment and I think he was already halfway to retiring. They sold their place last year, I will ask her what came of the whole thing (context: western Canada)
posted by ginger.beef at 10:59 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
Rheyden, that's interesting, but I'm not able to start spinning my own yarn. I love traditional hand crafts but I also love modernity (things like antibiotics and not being a subsistence farmer).
posted by rikschell at 11:23 AM on January 4
posted by rikschell at 11:23 AM on January 4
I didn't start sewing to make my own clothes, but I try to make most of what I wear now. I get pants that are long enough and have big ass pockets and shirts that have long enough sleeves!
But the choices for fabric by the yard are almost as bad as fast fashion. There is polyester in almost everything at joanne fabric. Their denim and pants weight twill choices almost always have 1 choice that is 100% cotton. They sometimes have 100% linen but it usually a very loose weave that isn't going to last long. There are no independent fabric stores in my town. The best one near me is 36 miles. She sources linen and cotton and denim from Japan and England. It's great quality and you pay for it. $30+ dollars a yard. Pants take close to 3 yards and shirts are 2 for me.
There is a creative reuse store near me that has lots of fabric. A fair amount of it is weird colors or patterns or polyester or old knit fabric that loses its stretch quickly or pieces of fabric too small to make garments with. The good stuff is sometimes a guessing game of fabric content. Is it 100% wool or cotton? I can do a burn test but only after I buy it!
The good part of sewing my own clothes is I can control the quality of construction at least. And if something breaks or rips I can repair it. But this is not an easy or cheap thing. I've been sewing for at least 8 years as an adult and I'm just getting to jeans. The thing every American owns and wears a lot. Having a sewing machine that can handle multiple layers of denim can be expensive.
I'm sorry if my comment is a bit all over the place. Fast fashion and sewing my own clothes and buying fabric from places like joann fabric is something I've thought about a lot. Am I helping if I'm still making more clothes when there's so much already made?
Anyway, this was an excellent post, chariot pulled by cassowaries!
posted by shmurley at 11:40 AM on January 4 [9 favorites]
But the choices for fabric by the yard are almost as bad as fast fashion. There is polyester in almost everything at joanne fabric. Their denim and pants weight twill choices almost always have 1 choice that is 100% cotton. They sometimes have 100% linen but it usually a very loose weave that isn't going to last long. There are no independent fabric stores in my town. The best one near me is 36 miles. She sources linen and cotton and denim from Japan and England. It's great quality and you pay for it. $30+ dollars a yard. Pants take close to 3 yards and shirts are 2 for me.
There is a creative reuse store near me that has lots of fabric. A fair amount of it is weird colors or patterns or polyester or old knit fabric that loses its stretch quickly or pieces of fabric too small to make garments with. The good stuff is sometimes a guessing game of fabric content. Is it 100% wool or cotton? I can do a burn test but only after I buy it!
The good part of sewing my own clothes is I can control the quality of construction at least. And if something breaks or rips I can repair it. But this is not an easy or cheap thing. I've been sewing for at least 8 years as an adult and I'm just getting to jeans. The thing every American owns and wears a lot. Having a sewing machine that can handle multiple layers of denim can be expensive.
I'm sorry if my comment is a bit all over the place. Fast fashion and sewing my own clothes and buying fabric from places like joann fabric is something I've thought about a lot. Am I helping if I'm still making more clothes when there's so much already made?
Anyway, this was an excellent post, chariot pulled by cassowaries!
posted by shmurley at 11:40 AM on January 4 [9 favorites]
To me, there are two main problems here
1) Fast Fashion
2) Microplastics in the environment
Right, and a card I’m putting on the table here, as people debate how to clothe the entire world in wool, is that with less of (1) - well, with less disposable use of synthetics in general, it seems like (2) would already be less of a problem in practice.
posted by atoxyl at 11:53 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
1) Fast Fashion
2) Microplastics in the environment
Right, and a card I’m putting on the table here, as people debate how to clothe the entire world in wool, is that with less of (1) - well, with less disposable use of synthetics in general, it seems like (2) would already be less of a problem in practice.
posted by atoxyl at 11:53 AM on January 4 [2 favorites]
Or at least if we’d produced less retroactively, producing less now presumably doesn’t make the existing contamination go away. But microplastic levels have increased massively in a decade, it’s not just that the stuff is around that’s worrisome, it’s that we’ve been adding exponentially more of it.
posted by atoxyl at 11:57 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
posted by atoxyl at 11:57 AM on January 4 [1 favorite]
<> I didn't start sewing to make my own clothes, but I try to make most of what I wear now. I get
There’s a skill loss problem here, too.
When I was a girl, my mother could casually make me some clothing. I myself can do basic sewing, and when I lost some real weight, I altered the clothing to fit me. I do basic repairs on fabric I can repair. But that’s uncommon - most people don’t and can’t do that. So they don’t complain about shitty fabrics because they’re just tossing the clothing when it breaks anyway.
There were also enough people who knew how to sew that tailoring was pretty cheap; everyone did it, which made clothes last. And clothes were built for tailoring - extra fabric in hems, etc.
Now the skills aren’t there so people can’t do it themselves and tailoring is incredibly expensive-30$ or more for an alteration is not uncommon, and the clothing just isn’t nice enough for that. So clothing producers don’t have to make stuff mending ready, which continues the cycle.
posted by corb at 3:58 AM on January 5 [6 favorites]
There’s a skill loss problem here, too.
When I was a girl, my mother could casually make me some clothing. I myself can do basic sewing, and when I lost some real weight, I altered the clothing to fit me. I do basic repairs on fabric I can repair. But that’s uncommon - most people don’t and can’t do that. So they don’t complain about shitty fabrics because they’re just tossing the clothing when it breaks anyway.
There were also enough people who knew how to sew that tailoring was pretty cheap; everyone did it, which made clothes last. And clothes were built for tailoring - extra fabric in hems, etc.
Now the skills aren’t there so people can’t do it themselves and tailoring is incredibly expensive-30$ or more for an alteration is not uncommon, and the clothing just isn’t nice enough for that. So clothing producers don’t have to make stuff mending ready, which continues the cycle.
posted by corb at 3:58 AM on January 5 [6 favorites]
Another problem is that people like new clothes. Not everyone, yes yes I know, but a lot of us. I try to wear my clothes until they wear out, but sometimes I just want a new, not-used hoodie, you know?
posted by The corpse in the library at 10:43 AM on January 5
posted by The corpse in the library at 10:43 AM on January 5
I'm harvesting from the other great comments upthread to make this pitch:
Like many environmentsl problems, the outline of the solution was evident in the 1960s and 1970s. We need laws and regulations and cultural reinforcement:
governemtns and companies need to solve this problem, and the general public needs to cooperate with that solution with proper education and incentive.
Reduce, Reuse and Recycle renewable resources produced in ways that minimize harm and distributed so that everyone has what they need before any surplus is auctioned to other (higher) bidders.
What does that look like for textiles: I love wool, i think it can play a role in some ecosystems and some clothing climates. Leather likewise. But cotton, hemp, linen and silk can scale quicker, be intercroped or rotated in more locations, yield more yards per hectare, and can be grown on land that currently grows animal feed.
Most governments have Ag policies that subsidize activities, zone land use, prohibit some crops (cocaine anyone?) and set prices (min and/or max) distribute rationed goods etc. Its within the wheelhouse of governments to ban synthetics and subsidize naturals and redirect land use away from animal ag and for textitles and plant based diets. Governments can require warranties for clothing so that companies must either make products durable or factor into their prices replacement.
Companies must ensure both that their product is recycliable or safely compostable in theory and actually recycled/composted in practice. Also that products are durable. Design covers the theory, don't blend in synthetics, have accurate labels. Warranty incentivises durability, price incentivises avoiding over consumption, bottle-deposit style redemption payments incentivizes recycling at end of life. Product id tags next to wash instructions can help fine or reward companies based on reclamation rates and lifespans.
And fashion designers can make clothes with useable pockets, eegonmic durable designs and the public can shun syntetics akin to how fur was shunned.
Of course, this isnt just clothes, its bedding, curtains, upholstery, etc.
We didnt know synthetic fabric was bad, but now we do. Lets chanfe collectively. Write ro you 95 year old congressman and make a xarbon copy to who ever Trump appoints ar the EPA... oh wait, we can't have nice things.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:11 AM on January 6
Like many environmentsl problems, the outline of the solution was evident in the 1960s and 1970s. We need laws and regulations and cultural reinforcement:
governemtns and companies need to solve this problem, and the general public needs to cooperate with that solution with proper education and incentive.
Reduce, Reuse and Recycle renewable resources produced in ways that minimize harm and distributed so that everyone has what they need before any surplus is auctioned to other (higher) bidders.
What does that look like for textiles: I love wool, i think it can play a role in some ecosystems and some clothing climates. Leather likewise. But cotton, hemp, linen and silk can scale quicker, be intercroped or rotated in more locations, yield more yards per hectare, and can be grown on land that currently grows animal feed.
Most governments have Ag policies that subsidize activities, zone land use, prohibit some crops (cocaine anyone?) and set prices (min and/or max) distribute rationed goods etc. Its within the wheelhouse of governments to ban synthetics and subsidize naturals and redirect land use away from animal ag and for textitles and plant based diets. Governments can require warranties for clothing so that companies must either make products durable or factor into their prices replacement.
Companies must ensure both that their product is recycliable or safely compostable in theory and actually recycled/composted in practice. Also that products are durable. Design covers the theory, don't blend in synthetics, have accurate labels. Warranty incentivises durability, price incentivises avoiding over consumption, bottle-deposit style redemption payments incentivizes recycling at end of life. Product id tags next to wash instructions can help fine or reward companies based on reclamation rates and lifespans.
And fashion designers can make clothes with useable pockets, eegonmic durable designs and the public can shun syntetics akin to how fur was shunned.
Of course, this isnt just clothes, its bedding, curtains, upholstery, etc.
We didnt know synthetic fabric was bad, but now we do. Lets chanfe collectively. Write ro you 95 year old congressman and make a xarbon copy to who ever Trump appoints ar the EPA... oh wait, we can't have nice things.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:11 AM on January 6
I'm just going to add that almost all of the "land used for growing animal feed" rhetoric is misleading, in that the majority of the time it is 1) land unsuitable for anything but growing grass, like mine which is almost entirely steep hillsides, or 2) the animal feed is actually the crop residue or processing residue that would otherwise be waste from a commodity crop, or 3) the animal feed crop is part of a beneficial crop rotation cycle with human feed crops (alfalfa being a prime example). Furthermore animals can graze many textile crops after harvest including cotton and hemp, so it's not either or, it's actually synergistic.
posted by Rhedyn at 5:32 AM on January 6
posted by Rhedyn at 5:32 AM on January 6
The vast majority of the 90 million acres of corn grown in the US is for animal feed or ethanol production.
posted by Mitheral at 6:55 AM on January 6 [1 favorite]
Feed use, a derived demand, is closely related to the number of animals (cattle, hogs, and poultry) that are fed corn and typically accounts for about 40 percent of total domestic corn use.Call it 36 million acres of land devoted to feed stock for animals. Basically the entire “principal crops area planted” of Kansas and half of Illinois. I know animal corn is different than people corn but I'd guess they are pretty interchangeable as far as growing conditions and land impact.
posted by Mitheral at 6:55 AM on January 6 [1 favorite]
"Or ethanol production" is doing a lot of work there. 45% of US corn crop is for ethanol production according to Wikipedia. Producing ethanol creates distillers grain as a byproduct, which is then used for animal feed. It is misleading to say that this is land devoted to feed stock for animals, just because the byproduct of the processing chain is fed to animals rather than being thrown away. I'd be interested to see any references to crops grown for animal feed as the primary purpose. I imagine there are some but almost all the internet rhetoric I see is like this, where processing byproducts, crop residue, and spoiled crops are fed to animals rather than wasted, but then people count all that up and misleadingly claim it is cropland devoted to animal feed.
posted by Rhedyn at 7:31 AM on January 6
posted by Rhedyn at 7:31 AM on January 6
Also, farmers producing large scale crops are generally doing so for the commodity market. They'll grow a big crop of something, whether corn, soybeans, wheat, etc and then sell the harvest to a broker. The broker will sell to whichever large scale buyers are offering the best price. So that harvest will wind up being used for whatever purpose a buyer was willing to pay for, which will depend on what prices are like and what the market is flooded with and what the quality of the harvest was. Sometimes it's only good enough for animal feed.
So the question of "is cropland being used for animal feed and could we stop and grow something better on it" is not easily answered. Sometimes it's a crop like alfalfa where the primary purpose is animal feed, so that's simpler, but as previously mentioned that's usually as part of a crop rotation which serves its own useful purpose.
We can look at the relative value of the different uses of the crop, in particular if I remember right from previous researches, until recently the primary value of soya was soybean oil and the soybean meal was the byproduct that was fed to animals, but in recent years the demand for soybean meal to feed chickens and pigs in China has accelerated to the point where the meal is worth more than the oil, so you could argue that means the soy is now being grown for animal feed in a way that was less true before. But the demand for soybean oil hasn't gone away, so do we stop producing that?
posted by Rhedyn at 7:51 AM on January 6
So the question of "is cropland being used for animal feed and could we stop and grow something better on it" is not easily answered. Sometimes it's a crop like alfalfa where the primary purpose is animal feed, so that's simpler, but as previously mentioned that's usually as part of a crop rotation which serves its own useful purpose.
We can look at the relative value of the different uses of the crop, in particular if I remember right from previous researches, until recently the primary value of soya was soybean oil and the soybean meal was the byproduct that was fed to animals, but in recent years the demand for soybean meal to feed chickens and pigs in China has accelerated to the point where the meal is worth more than the oil, so you could argue that means the soy is now being grown for animal feed in a way that was less true before. But the demand for soybean oil hasn't gone away, so do we stop producing that?
posted by Rhedyn at 7:51 AM on January 6
I'll bite on the animal ag Rhedyn. What percent of current high consuming countries animal products come from animals raised only on reverse-goldilocks marginal wasteland pasture that can't grow sunflower, buckwheat, dandelion or chenopodium but can be mob-grazed or free-ranged without damage? Ok, so we have no current ag products exclusively from those sources, but what fraction of those sources of the total animal nutrition we waste on animals? And those places aren't better as habitat?
The best use for crop residues isn't turning them into milk, meat or wool, its mushrooms, green manuere and mulch. The best use for steep rocky fragile ecosystems is as ecosystems, not for domesticated animals.
But lets set aside this all or nothing. We (the aggregate human impact) have to shrink into our (collective) footprint to make space for ecosystems and habitats, more humans (71 million more this year), better lives for the billions of humans that are suffering from material poverty and now, as this discussion shows, we don't have synthetic textiles to use as a way of reducing land use for textiles, indeed even durable slow organic fashion might require more land to kit out people.
But we can have that land, by taking it from the land that is used for animals that can be repurposed. If your rocky hillside isn't that land, then fine, but any land that can be repurposed should be.
Its not either or. we have to make the most of the clothes we have, make sure the replacement clothes are efficient and are produced and disposed of sustainably and that the materials we use aren't toxic to us or the ecosystems we expose.
Wool, leather, fur...better than nylon, neoprine, polyester, elastane and maybe viscose. (microplastics from viscose is not a topic im familiar with and whether they are doped with polluting additives I don't know).
So lets let plants do the heavy lifting, because we also need land for foresrs and for tree-farms. We are losing land to salt water, erosion, desertification and yes, to overgrazing despite what Allen Savory would claim about mob grazing during a wet period in southern africa.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 8:10 AM on January 6
The best use for crop residues isn't turning them into milk, meat or wool, its mushrooms, green manuere and mulch. The best use for steep rocky fragile ecosystems is as ecosystems, not for domesticated animals.
But lets set aside this all or nothing. We (the aggregate human impact) have to shrink into our (collective) footprint to make space for ecosystems and habitats, more humans (71 million more this year), better lives for the billions of humans that are suffering from material poverty and now, as this discussion shows, we don't have synthetic textiles to use as a way of reducing land use for textiles, indeed even durable slow organic fashion might require more land to kit out people.
But we can have that land, by taking it from the land that is used for animals that can be repurposed. If your rocky hillside isn't that land, then fine, but any land that can be repurposed should be.
Its not either or. we have to make the most of the clothes we have, make sure the replacement clothes are efficient and are produced and disposed of sustainably and that the materials we use aren't toxic to us or the ecosystems we expose.
Wool, leather, fur...better than nylon, neoprine, polyester, elastane and maybe viscose. (microplastics from viscose is not a topic im familiar with and whether they are doped with polluting additives I don't know).
So lets let plants do the heavy lifting, because we also need land for foresrs and for tree-farms. We are losing land to salt water, erosion, desertification and yes, to overgrazing despite what Allen Savory would claim about mob grazing during a wet period in southern africa.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 8:10 AM on January 6
Here's the thing, and I don't think you're going to like my answer much. First off, humans and domesticated animals are part of ecosystems. The fantasy of pure nature without humans involved has a lot of colonialist and ecofascist origins. Ask any indigenous group. I very much recommend David Elias' wonderful book Shaping the Wild for a useful perspective from a lifelong conservation professional.
Second, crop farming is often much more destructive than livestock. Plowing is terrible for soil erosion. Most crop farming, especially at scale, involves a barrage of herbicides and pesticides and artificial fertilisers. It is crop farming that is causing the insect species declines, including and not limited to bees. If you plowed my fields (which are not rocky, btw) after a few years all the soil would have washed down the slopes into the drainage ditches and been carried away. As it is, my sheep pastures (which include mature trees) are full of different herbs and flowers and grasses, rabbits, red kites, crows, moles, all sorts of small birds and rodents, lizards and frogs and toads, barn owls and tawny owls, occasionally badgers and foxes, and plenty of bees. All of which would be obliterated if they were converted to cropland.
Third, this notion of taking land from livestock to repurpose it for crops ignores the fact that for most land that is suitable for crops, livestock are grazing it in rotation and after the crop harvest. Which keeps the land fertile. I don't know why you think it is better to take tonnes and tonnes of cornstalks and bakery waste and brewery waste and spoiled grain and somehow grow mushrooms on it or spread it directly on the fields (?) rather than feed it to animals as has been done for centuries. It seems an extraordinary claim to me.
The worst of animal ag in my opinion is the intensive indoor chicken and pig farming. But I don't think it's worst because the animals are fed byproducts and excess from the commodity crop markets, I think it's worst because having that many animals of the same species in that small an area is bad for welfare, bad for infectious disease and incubating new diseases, and turns manure which should be a valuable fertiliser into a polluting problem by having far too much of it in one place to deal with.
posted by Rhedyn at 9:17 AM on January 6
Second, crop farming is often much more destructive than livestock. Plowing is terrible for soil erosion. Most crop farming, especially at scale, involves a barrage of herbicides and pesticides and artificial fertilisers. It is crop farming that is causing the insect species declines, including and not limited to bees. If you plowed my fields (which are not rocky, btw) after a few years all the soil would have washed down the slopes into the drainage ditches and been carried away. As it is, my sheep pastures (which include mature trees) are full of different herbs and flowers and grasses, rabbits, red kites, crows, moles, all sorts of small birds and rodents, lizards and frogs and toads, barn owls and tawny owls, occasionally badgers and foxes, and plenty of bees. All of which would be obliterated if they were converted to cropland.
Third, this notion of taking land from livestock to repurpose it for crops ignores the fact that for most land that is suitable for crops, livestock are grazing it in rotation and after the crop harvest. Which keeps the land fertile. I don't know why you think it is better to take tonnes and tonnes of cornstalks and bakery waste and brewery waste and spoiled grain and somehow grow mushrooms on it or spread it directly on the fields (?) rather than feed it to animals as has been done for centuries. It seems an extraordinary claim to me.
The worst of animal ag in my opinion is the intensive indoor chicken and pig farming. But I don't think it's worst because the animals are fed byproducts and excess from the commodity crop markets, I think it's worst because having that many animals of the same species in that small an area is bad for welfare, bad for infectious disease and incubating new diseases, and turns manure which should be a valuable fertiliser into a polluting problem by having far too much of it in one place to deal with.
posted by Rhedyn at 9:17 AM on January 6
We don't have to guess at the proportions of waste land, pasture and grain and soy feed in animal ag in OECD nations, we have stats.
We don't have to guess at what crops and systems produce more calories or protein, or for this post fiber or fleece or hide per acre, we have stats. The answers aren't the same in every place because the world isn't a homogenous spherical turkey of uniform density.
Industrial plant ag is also a disaster, and while it does well at subsidized revenue per acre, it is not the best (and clearly not the most sustainable) yeild per acre.
Land use is a major impact humans have on earth. A few animal lines and a few grasses and pulses dominate that impact. .If we want a livable planet, and to save as many of our holocene companions, ecosystems and peoples, we have to change and reduce how we impact the earth. many peoples managed to live sustainably and indefinately on various parts of the earth, and we should give their land back and learn from them, their descendents, neighbors and our records of them when else is unavailable.
Yes, everything that has anything living in it is technically a habitat for those things, let me clarify that industrially managed pastures, farm fields, orchards, fish farms and tree planations are habitats that have replaced previously evolved, diverse and resilient, ecosystems that indigenous people (be they hunter gatherers, herders, horticulturalists etx) managed and coexisted with sustainably and turned those into polluted, eroded, much less diverse and prone to diease and pest outbreak zones whose productivity requires resources we don't have unlimited supplies of and whose wastes are also poisons. And the sheep station is as much a colonial legacy as the barely mill and the drain tile.
Already global commodity markets are destroying tropical forests for palm and soy, and temperate land is already extensively used. If we need to stop making textiles from plastic, then we have to use less textile, ensure those who need more textile get it, and source the textiles we do need from land use. If wool gives more yard-years per acre in some place that is already under industrial management, then great, run sheep on it, but where flax, hemp, cotton, silk, and possible bamboo-viscose-cellulose outperform sheep, then sorry Mary, maybe you won't get to have a little lamb.
animal ag like SUVs are both inefficent and used at scale. If we struggle to get the public to regulate or restrict private jets and yatchs, how much harder to get animal ag and SUVs and suburbs regulated differently.
I don't think your crop rotation, crop waste marginal rocky steep land is representative of how most sheep are raised for wool, but I am open to being disproven, and again, where it is better than lets do it. The pastures in my province were wheat before trade deals killed that, and potato, dairy and beef are now vying for the subsidies. But maybe its different where you are.
Anyway. If we want better fashion, better textiles, better land use, better healthcare etc, we aren't going to be handed rhose things by industry or captured/corrupt agencies. We are going to have to demand them, build them and defend them. Labelling and consumer awareness is one front in that, so is lobbying and public protests and boycotts, so is fighting fascists and authoritarians who don't give a wit about pollution and wealth and land reform.
We might not agree on sheep, but i'll gladly take sheep over plastic.
See you in the trenches.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 10:48 AM on January 6
We don't have to guess at what crops and systems produce more calories or protein, or for this post fiber or fleece or hide per acre, we have stats. The answers aren't the same in every place because the world isn't a homogenous spherical turkey of uniform density.
Industrial plant ag is also a disaster, and while it does well at subsidized revenue per acre, it is not the best (and clearly not the most sustainable) yeild per acre.
Land use is a major impact humans have on earth. A few animal lines and a few grasses and pulses dominate that impact. .If we want a livable planet, and to save as many of our holocene companions, ecosystems and peoples, we have to change and reduce how we impact the earth. many peoples managed to live sustainably and indefinately on various parts of the earth, and we should give their land back and learn from them, their descendents, neighbors and our records of them when else is unavailable.
Yes, everything that has anything living in it is technically a habitat for those things, let me clarify that industrially managed pastures, farm fields, orchards, fish farms and tree planations are habitats that have replaced previously evolved, diverse and resilient, ecosystems that indigenous people (be they hunter gatherers, herders, horticulturalists etx) managed and coexisted with sustainably and turned those into polluted, eroded, much less diverse and prone to diease and pest outbreak zones whose productivity requires resources we don't have unlimited supplies of and whose wastes are also poisons. And the sheep station is as much a colonial legacy as the barely mill and the drain tile.
Already global commodity markets are destroying tropical forests for palm and soy, and temperate land is already extensively used. If we need to stop making textiles from plastic, then we have to use less textile, ensure those who need more textile get it, and source the textiles we do need from land use. If wool gives more yard-years per acre in some place that is already under industrial management, then great, run sheep on it, but where flax, hemp, cotton, silk, and possible bamboo-viscose-cellulose outperform sheep, then sorry Mary, maybe you won't get to have a little lamb.
animal ag like SUVs are both inefficent and used at scale. If we struggle to get the public to regulate or restrict private jets and yatchs, how much harder to get animal ag and SUVs and suburbs regulated differently.
I don't think your crop rotation, crop waste marginal rocky steep land is representative of how most sheep are raised for wool, but I am open to being disproven, and again, where it is better than lets do it. The pastures in my province were wheat before trade deals killed that, and potato, dairy and beef are now vying for the subsidies. But maybe its different where you are.
Anyway. If we want better fashion, better textiles, better land use, better healthcare etc, we aren't going to be handed rhose things by industry or captured/corrupt agencies. We are going to have to demand them, build them and defend them. Labelling and consumer awareness is one front in that, so is lobbying and public protests and boycotts, so is fighting fascists and authoritarians who don't give a wit about pollution and wealth and land reform.
We might not agree on sheep, but i'll gladly take sheep over plastic.
See you in the trenches.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 10:48 AM on January 6
Neither the article nor the comments here have discussed it much, but how well do semi-synthetics like rayon bridge the gap between limited ability to produce and ecological impact? Unlike wool or cotton, semi-synthetics mostly seem to need undifferentiated plant cellulose so there's less of a question of where you're going to put all those sheep or climate-specific crops, but I admit I don't know much about how these fibers measure up on durability, environmental impacts of production, etc.
posted by jackbishop at 10:33 AM on January 7 [3 favorites]
posted by jackbishop at 10:33 AM on January 7 [3 favorites]
Rayon (viscose) is indeed polymerized cellulose. The good news is that burning and composting the raw rayon is fine. What dyes and flame retardents get used is a different store, but a problem applicable to natural and synthetic clothing.
You can source cellulose from many woody fibery plants, though bamboo i think has the lowest price point.
The process of extracting and polymerizing the cellulose can in theory not produce any especially difficult wastes, but do the actual producers behave well or is it intentionally supply chain agnosticism like slave labor, child labor and unsafe conditions like the rest of the garment industry, i don't know.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:07 PM on January 7
You can source cellulose from many woody fibery plants, though bamboo i think has the lowest price point.
The process of extracting and polymerizing the cellulose can in theory not produce any especially difficult wastes, but do the actual producers behave well or is it intentionally supply chain agnosticism like slave labor, child labor and unsafe conditions like the rest of the garment industry, i don't know.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 5:07 PM on January 7
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