It has the ability to naturally absorb and store oils

British salons contribute to cleaning the sea with hair

• Fry Taylor is one of the founders of the "Green Salon" group, who is leading the initiative.

  Reuters

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A group of environmentalists is encouraging hairdressers across Britain to recycle hair for use in cleaning marine oil pollution spots, making compost or generating power.

Indeed, London is at the forefront of hairdressing, but the British capital lags behind in recycling the waste produced by this sector.

In a barber shop in the east of the capital, Frey Taylor, one of the founders of the "Green Salon" group, is preparing to explain how to use hair to make decontaminating filters.

Taylor pours water into a tank and adds some motor oil to it, then opens a cotton mesh and stuffs it with hair.

Once the roll is complete, he places it on the surface of the contaminated water, and it is only seconds for the water to come back clean.

"The hair naturally absorbs the oil and stores it," the man explains.

Experts explain that a kilogram of hair absorbs up to eight liters of oil, and the idea of ​​using it as filters to remove pollution comes from the United States, and its effectiveness has been proven all over the world in absorbing oil in the sea, as happened with the oil slick caused by the sinking of a Japanese tanker off the coast. The coast of the island of Mauritius in July 2020.

And when the Green Salon group was formed last summer, Britain was far behind in recycling, according to Frey, who notes that “the infrastructure to recycle this waste does not exist” in the UK, adding: “We will not wait five or 10 years for governments to introduce These regimes will do it ourselves.”

green tax

Green Salon believes that the amount of waste generated by the hairdressing sector in Britain is enough to fill 50 football fields annually, but most of it goes to landfills, including aluminum foil, dye tubes and 99% of cut hair.

Chemical waste such as dye, bleaching and softening products is another big problem.

"About 30,000 salons and 100,000 independent hairdressers are currently pouring huge amounts of hydrogen peroxide, ammonia and other products into their drains," Fry says.

However, the group urges them to collect these products and send them to a power plant.

At his hair salon in trendy London's Spitalfields, Adam Reed proudly explains to one of his clients his recycling system.

The world-famous stylist says he was "amazed" by what he learned from the "Green Salon" group.

He adds, "Thanks to them, I realized that sustainability was absent from hairdressing salons, and that it was easy to include its application in our daily work, after we realized the severity of the problem."

“It is very simple, we have different bins for waste, and they are all marked,” he explains. Some are for hair, others for protective supplies, another for metal, and a fourth for paper and plastic.

The salon also recycles the remaining dye products.

Adam Reed imposes on his customers a green tax of a pound or two, indicating that their response to it is "very positive".

Salons pay 120 pounds ($165) to join the Green Salon.

“A powerful nutrient”

Another green use for hair is fertilizer, as it is rich in nitrogen, which makes it an ideal supplement for fertilizer.

Green Salon member Ryan Crawford, who owns a salon in Milton Keynes, 80km north of London, has tested this type of fertilizer on vegetables in his garden.

Crawford points out two small cabbage plants, the first of which is surrounded by hair and in good condition, and the second planted without hair looks bit off and looks like a skeleton.

He explains that "the hair forms a protective barrier around the base of the planting buds, preventing them from being destroyed by slugs and snails."

On the other hand, the hair around the plant contributes to preserving moisture, which “constitutes a highly effective nutrient for the agricultural land,” as he explains.

600 salons

In one year, 600 salons in Britain and Ireland joined the group that managed to collect about 500 kilograms of hair, which was used to combat an oil spill in Northern Ireland last May and to clean waterways, and was used as fertilizer.

Green Salon also collected 3.5 tons of metal materials that are being recycled.

It currently hopes to export the model on a large scale to other countries in Europe.

• A kilogram of hair absorbs up to eight liters of oil.

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