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My Grandma will tell you that polyester is fabulous. But of course when she buys it, and certainly when she first started buying it, it didn't come with an EcoHazard label, but that's precisely what it is.

Polyester is a long plastic fiber, more precisely a polyethylene teraphthalate, or PET fiber. The same plastic used to make disposable drink bottles. But again we ask, how does this constitute an environmental hazard? Well the ethylene in PET comes from crude oil, like the kind they dig up in the Alberta oil sands, releasing over 23 million tons of CO2 annually in the process. The other base component, naphthalene is made from coal tar.

The other synthetic fibres aren't much better. Nylon is made directly from coal, and spandex, like polyester has its heritage in crude oil.

Then there are the "manufactured fibres" like rayon (aka viscose). These are not considered synthetic by the US Federal Trade Commission, since the starting ingredient is cellulose. In a nutshell, that means wood pulp. In processing the pulp it's exposed to caustic soda, sulphuric acid, and carbon disulfide (which has been shown to cause neural disorders in workers at rayon manufacturers).

So far, I'm not inspired to put any of these things on my body, how about you? So in protest we turn to natural fibres, the most obvious being cotton. Well, it's true that cotton is natural; all that happens to manufacture it is to grow the crop, harvest the pods and clean and spin the fibres. Fairly easy on the planet, by the sounds of it. But there is a problem: the chemicals and resources required to grow cotton conventionally.

According to the USGS, cotton fields require up to 12 kg of pesticides per hectare, which accounts for one third of the world's total pesticide use. What's more, according to waterfootprint.org the production of cotton worldwide takes 107 Billion cubic metres of groundwater per year. That works out to about 1 cubic metre per pound of cotton product, and another half of a cubic metre of water gets polluted in the process.

The effects of this massive irrigation have already been felt in eastern Europe, where Uzbekistani cotton production has resulted in the desiccation of the Aral sea. The sea, which is actually a lake, was the fourth largest in the world prior to its draining for irrigation, but has since lost 80% of its volume. The result is
40 000 km2 of toxic land, and two remaining lakes that are so salty that all 24 commercial fish species have disappeared. And all for the sake of a T-shirt.

So what is the answer? Well, organic cotton, to start. Organic farming uses no pesticides, and no synthetic fertilizers, and while irrigation is still practiced, crops are rotated to maintain soil fertility, consequently, the soil retains more water. Even better, choose clothing made with other fibres. Hemp, bamboo and soy are all much less intensive to produce, while still making fabulous EcoFashions!

Learn more about this author, Krista White.
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