Lend Your Locks to the Environment

Your snipped-off tresses at the hair salon can do much more than sit idly in the trash. Rather than let hair clippings go to waste, Matter of Trust, a San Francisco-based non-profit, collects them from over 300,000 salons and barbershops throughout North and South America, China, and India. The locks are then woven and needlepunched into hair mats to soak up oil spills.

Any hair, including processed hair, sponges up oil, even better than fur can. Once wrung out, the mats can be reused 30 to 100 times, after which they're broken down organically using mushroom spores, making them environmentally superior to petroleum-based spill products such as polypropylene pads. Plus, 98 percent of the oil sopped up by the mats can be recovered, according to OttiMat, the company that invented the mats and loans out the design to Matter of Trust for remediating emergency spills, including the Nov. 7, 2007 spill that engulfed San Francisco Bay.

Encourage your salon to sign up for free with Matter of Trust. Individuals can also send in their hair, regardless of the treatments you've subjected it to. The organization asks that you place your hair-free of metal pins or clips-in a box lined with garbage bags.

Mail to:

Oil Spill Hair Mats

DR3 - Matter of Trust.org

1960 Williams Street

San Leandro CA 94577

::Portland Tribune

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