Hair today, green tomorrow: UK stylists join eco-drive

Hairdressers across Britain are being urged to do their bit for the environment by recycling snipped-off hair to help clean up oil spills, make compost or generate energy.

At an east London salon, Fry Taylor, one of the founders of the Green Salon Collective, demonstrates spare hair being used in depolluting filters.

He shows how a cotton net stuffed with hair, swept across the surface of a tank of water contaminated with motor oil, instantly cleans up the pollutant.

"The hair just naturally will absorb the oil and hold on to the oil, that's the important factor," Taylor, a former hairdresser, told AFP.

A kilo of hair can absorb up to eight liters [two gallons] of oil, according to experts.

The idea of using hair filters originated in the United States and has already been tested in real disasters, such as when a Japanese tanker sank off the coast of Mauritius a year ago.

Britain was lagging behind in recycling unwanted hair when the collective formed last summer, according to Taylor.

"There are, in other countries around the world, recycling systems for hairdressing salons," he said.

"In the U.K. and Ireland, they just don't have the infrastructure.

"We're not going to wait another five or 10 years for governments and councils to have these systems in place, let's just do it ourselves," he added.

The waste produced by the hairdressing industry in the U.K. each year could fill 50 football stadiums, the collective said.

Most rubbish, including aluminum foil, colored tubes, and 99 percent of cut hair, is sent to a landfill site, it added.
Another big problem is chemical waste such as dyes and bleaches.

"There are currently approximately 30,000 salons and another 100,000...

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