Turns Out, Your Donated Hair Could Help Save Oceans From Dangerous Oil Spills

Every day, Lisa Craig Gautier and her team sort dozens of packages in their San Francisco-based warehouse, each containing human hair. Some are from blonde-haired women, and some from brunettes. Packages coming from Boston are usually sent by redheads. Once, an Olympic swimmer even sent them a package filled with his underarm hair. Some of these hairs have been swept from the floors of hair salons. Other parcels are crowded with fluffy clumps of hair from the bodies of buffalo, sheep, dogs, and llamas. These tangles of hair aren’t supposed to be used for making some uncanny cosplay wigs. Rather, Gautier calls this collection her “hair force.”

Gautier’s non-profit organization, Matter of Trust (MOT), utilizes stray human hair to soak up oil spills and save the environment. The next time you see your barber brooming a customer’s hair off the salon floor, you can interrupt and ask them if you can collect that hair, if it’s not oily. The barber might give you a look of surprise, but when you arrive at this warehouse in San Francisco, your collected pieces will be received with utmost honor and respect. It’s your contribution towards protecting the environment. These hairs will be laid out on a bed of sharp nails and converted into a doormat-like rug that will be used to soak up spilled oil from the planet.

MOT, which conducts the entire hair-transformation operation, is on a mission to encourage optimal resource renewability by collecting and recycling waste fibers like hair trimmings, fur clippings, fleece, feathers, laundry lint, and animal hair to save the environment. A pound of hair can soak up a liter of oil in less than a minute.

The organization emerged into the picture after an Alabama-based hair stylist named Phil McCrory caught sight of a live otter dipped in oil after the Exxon Valdez oil tanker spilled into the waters of Alaska, as also seen in footage shared by Business Insider. He was just watching the news about this tragedy on CNN when a lightbulb popped into his brain. He wanted to save these animals. He partnered with Gautier, and this is how MOT was born.

Their idea was first put to the test in 2010, when the greatest oil spill unfolded in American history. An explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig spewed 4 million barrels in the Gulf of Mexico during just three months. Not only did the water become poisoned, but the wild animals nesting in these waters choked, and some of them even died. Oil, which is as precious as gold, can be a priceless resource for deriving commercial energy, but only as long as it is bubbling inside tankers and containers. The moment the container tumbles and tips down, the oil is no longer precious. It is now a destructive force that carries the potential of wiping away life from Earth.

While the glistening appearance of oil makes it attractive for birds and animals, its chemistry secretly wreaks havoc on their throat. According to a study published in Regional Studies in Marine Science, oil is composed of aromatic hydrocarbons and benzene compounds. In the thousands of oil spills that erupt each year, these chemicals seep into natural environments, penetrate into plant cells, smother the birds’ feathers, and bleed into the oceans, choking marine animals with hypothermia.

To prevent these hazards, MOT’s employees create fibrous felted mats, stuffed with the donated hair. These hairs are often wrapped in recycled burlap sacks or pantyhose to make environmentally-friendly brooms and waddles, which soak up oil. But their most popular creation is these “hair mats,” designed as part of the “Hair Matters Program.” These mats, when placed on the spilled oil, soak up petrochemicals much faster than the typical polypropylene booms, petroleum, or spray chemicals used to clean the spills. Bonus, they don’t hurt the environment.