Bring your holey, your tired and your shabby: Brandon to gather textiles in recycling project
In Brandon, 1.4 million kilograms of textiles are bought annually and 85% goes into the landfill
That worn-out and lumpy Pooh bear or tattered Tigger doesn't need to go in the garbage when it can have a second life as home insulation.
The same goes for old clothes, shoes, bedding, pillows, curtains, sleeping bags and more.
Quit trying to make the landfill a softer place, say recycling experts.
A new pilot project coming to Brandon, Man., is encouraging people to divert unwanted fabrics, textiles and plush toys from the dump and toward special bins or thrift stores instead.
The city is one of several municipalities that have signed on to a research study led by Diabetes Canada and York University, aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions, saving water and extending the useful lives of landfills.
Diabetes Canada has been operating a textile collection program for more than 30 years, gathering items left inside bins placed around many Canadian cities and through doorstep pickup.
The goal of the study is to identify ways to increase the recovery of textiles by educating people and encouraging them to send those items into the next manifestation of their existence.
'A fast-food fashion society'
According to researchers, approximately 80 billion new items of clothing are produced worldwide every year, using huge amounts of water and electricity. And most items are thrown in the garbage once someone is done with them.
The process to create a single pair of jeans requires 1,800 gallons of water, from cotton plant to final product, said Lindsay Hargreaves, environmental initiatives co-ordinator for the City of Brandon.
A T-shirt takes 700 gallons, she said.
The average Canadian purchases 70 new articles of clothing a year, contributing to the 12 million tons of annual textile waste. The reason much of it is thrown away is because it is cheaply made, said Hargreaves.
"North America is like a fast-food fashion society," she said.
In Brandon specifically, 1.4 million kilograms of textiles are bought annually and 85 per cent goes into the landfill, said Hargreaves.
However, nearly 95 per cent of all textiles donated can be reworn, recycled, repurposed or reused.
"The last resort should be putting it into your garbage because there's a lot of other purposes it can go to," Hargreaves said.
Textiles are turned into insulation, painter's cloths, tiles, carpets and even countertops, among other products.
"This is an opportunity to educate [the] public and change those numbers [of items being tossed into the landfill]," Hargreaves said.
Textiles consist of all clothing and shoes for adults, children and babies, including personal items such as bathing suits, bathrobes and even undergarments.
Also included are many accessories such as purses, belts, jewellery and hats. Household items such as bedding, towels, curtains, pillows and sleeping bags are also considered textiles.
"You can donate the holey, lonely sock, or if you had a pair of shoes but somehow lost one and don't know what to do with the other one? You can donate that. They'll turn into different uses," Hargreaves said.
The pilot project, which is tentatively set to start in August and will run about two years, will see 20 of the Diabetes Canada bins in Brandon rebranded to say the city is involved in the textile diversion program.
The bins, most of which are currently on private property, will then be moved onto city property to make them more accessible.
Any organizations that collect textile items, such as thrift stores, will also be given a decal.
The rebranding will help raise awareness among the public about the project and the value of donating those types of goods, Hargreaves said.
Winnipeg has more than 100 Diabetes Canada bins for textile recycling but is not part of the York University pilot project.
A spokesperson for the city said Winnipeg does not track textile content in waste brought to the Brady Road landfill, so there are no statistics on how much is dumped every year.
Winnipeggers are strongly encouraged, however, to re-purpose those items by dropping them at any of many not-for-profits that collect used items as part of their fundraising programs, the spokesperson said.
Locations of bins in the city can be found through the Diabetes Canada website.
Items collected by Diabetes Canada are resold by the organization to thrift stores. The proceeds are used to fund outreach programs like food banks, shelters, children's camps and addiction treatment facilities.
Every year, Diabetes Canada's collection efforts divert 100 million pounds from landfills and reduce 280 million kilograms from the carbon footprint.
An awareness campaign about the pilot project will be launched soon and the public is encouraged to visit the website for the Brandon Environment Committee for more information.
Once the pilot project is underway, the website will also contain regularly updated information, provided by York University, on greenhouse gas emissions reduced, water saved and the amount of textiles collected and diverted from landfills.
The data will be broken down by municipality so people can see what their individual cities accomplished.
Do your research
If you do decide to donate your old clothes and other textiles, it's important to do your research to find the right charity.
Like Diabetes Canada, Goodwill Industries and the Salvation Army collect clothing donations for reselling in their thrift stores. The money is also used for community programs.
However, CBC's Marketplace reported earlier this year that some collection bins are operated by for-profit groups who sell the items overseas, where they sometimes end up in markets but often in the trash. The money earned by the for-profit groups never finds its way back into the community where the donation was made.
Hargreaves said Brandon only has Diabetes Canada donation bins and the environment committee website will list where they can be found and who is benefiting from the donations.
A number of major retailers have started offering in-store recycling bins, suggesting the donations could be made into new clothing items.
But some critics question the motives of those stores, saying they're just trying to profit from the bins as well, since shoppers get a coupon or discount on a future purchase.
The Marketplace story found very few articles of clothing can actually be made into new shirts or pants. That because many of our clothes are made of blended fibres, so they don't break down easily.
When you recycle cotton and wool, for example, the quality of the material is diminished.
Claudia Marsales, the senior manager of waste and environmental management in Markham, Ont., said the best way to give your clothes a longer life is to repair them when necessary rather than buying new ones.
That city, just north of Toronto, has banned textiles from its landfills because there was so much of that type of waste. It is one of only two Canadian municipalities to do so, along with Colchester, N.S.
But Marsales says the most important advice is simple.
"Don't buy so much."
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