Donate Hair to Clean Up Oil Spills

I swear I'll post a more glamorous post in the next few days with new inventory I've been working on, but in the meantime, I wanted to pass this very important information to anyone out there. Yes, even if you are not affected by the oil spill in the immediate sense, there is something you can do to help out. I have scheduled to get my hair trimmed next week and a girlfriend of mine told me about this.

Hair is THE most efficient material for absorbing oil -- that's why we have to wash it so often!

Reuse of Hair Clippings for Oil Cleanup

Hair is THE most efficient material for absorbing oil -- that's why we have to wash it so often!
Mats of human (and pet) hair, which naturally acts as a sponge to absorb oil from air and water are being used with oil spills, plant nurseries and more.

In the recent Calfornia oil spill, the hair mats were used to soakup the oil, and then volunteers added mushrooms, which absorb the oil over a 12-week period to turn the hair mats into nontoxic compost.

Hair Salons Divert Hair Clippings for Recycling

Hair salons generously send their swept up hair clippings to a recycling depot in California provided by St. Vincent de Paul's. This partnership program combines reuse, micro-economy and ecological oil spill clean up. Salons have free access to the Excess Access database which catalogs the postage donations and emails receipts for the recycled hair donations.
There are over 370,000 hair salons in the US and each cut about one pound of hair a day! Matter of Trust does the outreach for the program through posters in salons and media PR.

Please let your hair salon and dog groomer know about this wonderful program that will help all of us in the long run. Please, think of them who can't help themselves.

And stay tuned for a glamorous post soon. I promise.