The High Cost of Fashion on Our Planet
How today’s fashion trends are damaging the environment
You may be reading this article sitting in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. Your washing machine may be chugging away in the background cleaning your dirty clothes. And if you walk over to your bedroom closet, you may even find several items that you haven’t ever worn.
You are the classic consumer.
And because today’s textiles have become so cheap and plentiful, your life has become inundated with them. Trendy services like StitchFix and Fabletics now show up at your doorstep with surprising regularity. You don’t even have to leave your home to go shopping.
But your present-day penchant for fashion comes at a cost. The clothes you are wearing and abandoning with alarming regularity are putting an immense strain on our oceans, water supply, and eco-system at large.
The environmental impact of fashion
Today, the fashion industry is reportedly responsible for 10% of all the carbon emissions in the world. And according to a report by the Ellen McArthur Foundation, if current trends continue, this number is expected to jump to 50% of the total carbon footprint by 2030.
In the US alone, we consume more than one billion…
