Was It Polyester All Along?
This pro bono article was published in Apparel Insider Issue 14, July 2020. After publication, Higg Co issued a new version of the MSI, reducing the impact of polyester per kilo from 44 to 36.2, and increasing the impact for silk from 681/kilo to 1086. The Sustainable Apparel Coalition offered no explanation for these changes.
A Little Background:
There is no agreed definition of what “sustainable” or “more sustainable” actually means in the apparel industry. There is no generally accepted system of measurement, and there is absolutely no oversight. Everyone from the big brands to Vogue and Business of Fashion talks about claims/materials independently verified/certified by “Global not for profits” (GNOPs), but not for profit does not equal not for money. And are the GNOPs in the fashion sector truly independent?
Let’s take a quick walk back in time, and remember, the following is indicative, not exhaustive, you might like to try checking the history and funding of your own preferred GNOP and see what you find.
Patagonia founded the Organic Exchange (OE) “to increase global sales of organic cotton apparel” in 2002. Shell Oil joined in funding OE in 2006, and in 2008 “led the creation of a partnership between Organic Exchange and C&A to improve the lives of poor Indian farmers”. Why Patagonia was collaborating with an oil company, subsequently listed 7th on the Climate Accountability Institute list of most polluting, remains a mystery.
By 2010, the Organic Exchange had become Textile Exchange (TE); Patagonia co-founded The Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC) with Walmart; and C&A and Shell had formed CottonConnect, which many seem to mistake for an GNOP but is actually registered as a Private Limited Company, whose ownership was ceded to TE and the C&A Foundation - now Laudes Foundation, on 15/12/2016.
I have asked both Shell and CottonConnect for any studies demonstrating the socio economic and environmental benefits of their “method’ (which now includes promotion of BCI cotton, as well as organic). There are none - it seems none were ever carried out.
I think we can conclude that CottonConnect helped C&A sell 38 million garments as “sustainable”. The evidence that it enhanced the lives of many farmers however, is nowhere to be found. The CottonConnect web pages feature glowing endorsements from both Laudes and TE, without mentioning that when C&A gave CottonConnect €7.5 million in charitable funding it was donating to its own subsidiary. I assume all this is perfectly legal, I would however submit the owners of a company posting glowing reviews without making it perfectly clear that they are the ultimate beneficiaries, is hardly transparent. I would also submit that CottonConnect and TE cannot testify that C&A’s cotton has been “sustainably sourced” as this is not an arms-length verification.
Moving on: in 2011, the SAC released the first Higg Index (also known as the Higg, or the Higg MSI). Nike added their work to the Higg in 2012. Like CottonConnect, the Higg Index also appears to now be for profit: In 2019,” Higg Co spun off to become the technical powerhouse behind the SAC. Higg Co has exclusive licensing use of the Higg Index.” And no, I don’t know what that really means either.
Since the aforementioned initiatives/companies were established in the early 2000s, a host of other GNOPs have sprung up in the apparel sector: Fashion for Good, The Organic Cotton Accelerator, BCI, Fashion Revolution, The Global Fashion Agenda… all of them are funded by a movable feast including H&M, C&A, Nike...And whilst Patagonia is now little mentioned as founding/funding any of them, it remains on the Board of both the SAC and TE. Since conclusions/recommendations reached by Patagonia-funded studies can be found repeated, without qualm or question, by various initiatives, I think we can conclude that Patagonia remains extremely influential in what is claimed/transmitted by the sustainable apparel sector.
The first problem with this burgeoning, is that all of these initiatives and associations produce reports/studies/white papers/blueprints that are quoted and cross-referenced as if they were serious academic publications. They are not. They are neither written, nor peer reviewed by leading academics. So are many of these reports, rankings, and indices little more than PR exercises for those who fund them?
Let’s see.
But first, some context:
Take a look at the chart above.
(source: Source UN World Population Prospects, 2019, Volume 1. Textile Exchange 2020 Preferred Fiber and Materials Market Report).
It is immediately apparent that the sole engine and enabler of the unsustainable surge in fiber and fabric production that has occured since 1975 (so called ‘Fast Fashion), is polyester.
Production of silk and wool has actually declined, that of cotton has risen only moderately. It is quite simple, without the explosion in cheap polyester, the apparel mountain would never have occurred. Rising prices, as manufacturers tried to encourage an increased supply of farmed fibers, would - without the need for any expensive initiatives, costly campaigns, or global conferences - have stifled demand through market forces. Cheap fast fashion and athleisure would have died before they took off.
The SAC’s members have - by definition - a vested interest in portraying the fibers they use as more sustainable. So let's take a quick look at the SAC’s members. Are there large numbers of fast fashion and athleisure brands? Why yes, there are. Let’s take a closer look at the product mix of a random selection - Patagonia, Nike, Walmart, C&A, H&M, ASOS, for example - do we see large amounts of polyester and her poly cousins? Why yes, we do.
So what if….?
Well let’s look a little closer, and here, remember that whilst the SAC and their very supportive funding brands all try to portray the Higg as sole arbiter of what is or is not more sustainable in the apparel sector, this role is entirely self appointed. You, I, or the average silk, wool or cotton farmer have no right to see how the index values were calculated, what underlying LCA was used - let alone what it said - and have neither voice nor recourse in any of it. The big brands have decided and we are expected to listen.
A few Assertions that don’t quite pan out:
So how does the SAC rate polyester and all her little poly cousins? It finds them very sustainable indeed. According to Higg a kilo of polyester has an impact of 44 per kilo. All poly’s little cousins - fabrics made of PP, PU, PTT, PLA - come in with similar impact values, ranging from 37 to 54 per kilo.
What a happy coincidence!
The question of course, is how does the Higg reach those values? They claim it’s “science based”, but is it?
1.The Higg Index ignores socio-economic impact
I am not sure that everyone is aware of this. Certainly the Higg appears to evaluate socio economic impact - I quote a few sample statements from their website:
"The Sustainable Apparel Coalition leads a groundbreaking industry collaboration. Members are committed to measuring and improving social and environmental sustainability impacts."
“The Sustainable Apparel Coalition’s vision is of an apparel, footwear, and textile industry that produces no unnecessary environmental harm and has a positive impact on the people and communities associated with its activities"
"The Higg Index is a suite of tools that enables brands, retailers, and facilities of all sizes — at every stage in their sustainability journey — to accurately measure and score a company or product’s social or environmental sustainability performance."
"By scaling the Higg Index globally, we are driving the social and environmental improvements the industry needs to become sustainable."
But when I contacted the SAC in December 2019, enquiring if the Higg intended to amend its score for organic cotton, now that we know that a significant percentage is sourced from Xinjiang, and so tainted with prison labour, child labour, forced labour, imposed sinification, and worse. I received the following response:
“The Higg MSI does not measure social impacts, nor does it claim to.”
Seriously? But what about all the statements I just quoted?.
Most egregiously, the potential benefit that could accrue to some of the world’s poorest - farmers in the global south - from having a stable and ready market for their main cash “crops”: various wools, silk, cotton, and the other natural fibers, is ignored. So in the SAC’s world, whether the big fashion groups source from the Koch and Huntsman families, or from some of the poorest and most disadvantaged on the planet, is one and the same thing.
How this enables brands to promote and report their progress in achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals, as the Higg BRM, not to mention many of the brands own websites claim they can, and do, escapes me.
2. The Higg evaluates cradle to gate ONLY
This is another Higg trait many seem blissfully unaware of. If you dig about on the SAC website, it does state it somewhere in the small print.
The banner statements on their web pages however, paint a very different picture:
“The Higg Index delivers a holistic overview that empowers businesses to make meaningful improvements that protect the well-being of factory workers, local communities, and the environment.”
“The SAC’s Higg Materials Sustainability Index (Higg MSI) is the apparel industry’s most trusted tool to accurately measure the environmental sustainability impacts of materials”
But as we have already noted, the Higg Index is only cradle to gate - what happens when that garment is worn and ultimately disposed of, is not included. In short, the Higg Index can only claim to deliver a holistic overview if all fabrics behave in exactly the same way when used, and disposed of.
And we know they don’t.
3. All fabrics shed fibers
Microfibers from polyester and her poly cousins, have in just the past six months, been reported in Antarctic ice, the Mariana Trench (microplastic fiber was found in the gut a new species of crustacean),and in unexpectedly large amounts in the deepest Mediterranean. In May alone we found both that the abundance of oceanic microplastic pollution has probably been 100% underestimated - there are twice as many as we thought! And that rehabilitation of Rivers in the South Wales valleys - once among the most polluted on Earth has been compromised by plastic microfibers. Whilst June brought the news that even the most isolated areas in the United States—national parks and national wilderness areas—accumulate microplastic particles after they are transported there by wind and rain. And “most of these plastic particles are synthetic microfibers used for making clothing”.
The authors of the last study assert: ”These findings should underline the importance of reducing pollution from such materials.” The Mariana scientists named their crustacean Eurythenes Plasticus to draw attention to the current microplastic fiber pollution crisis.
Of course there are studies with conflicting results, and not all universities and all studies are equal. So what are we to make of all of this? Fortunately EURATEX, the European Apparel and Textile Confederation, Cross Industry Agreement (CIA) for the prevention of microplastic release sought a scientific perspective on microplastics in nature and society from the European Commission’s Scientific Advice Mechanism SAPEA, in order to guide us. The outcome was published in January 2019.
Cutting through conflicting reports and studies, this group of expert academics concluded that whilst much is unclear, and there is a need to standardise and internationally harmonise Nano- and microplastics (NMPs) measurement methods, so that they can be applied on a comparable routine basis, and even though ‘high quality’ risk assessment is not yet feasible, the recommended course of action is to reduce, prevent and mitigate pollution with NMP.
These messages from the scientific community have fallen on deaf ears in the apparel sector. The SAC, H&M, C&A, Global fashion Agenda, and countless others, not only maintain that there is no need to mitigate plastic fiber consumption, but astoundingly, all actually insist that polyester and her cousins are the world’s most sustainable fibers - by a huge margin - and this is endorsed enthusiastically by everyone from Vogue Business to Patagonia!
Some brands try to suggest that there is a bit of a problem but that it is just in the wash cycle that these fibers are released, and the problem will resolve itself as soon as washing machine manufacturers install better filters and consumers use guppy bags.
This is not true.
Clothes release fibers as you walk, sit, run, sleep, indeed, a study published at the beginning of this year found “that the emission of fibres while wearing clothes is likely of a similar order of magnitude as that from washing them”. Worse, as Patagonia's own 2016 study revealed, the older the garment the more fibers it will shed!
Given that cotton/silk/linen/wool have been worn for millennia without any apparent harm to life and nature, the general consensus is that untreated natural fibers pose no threat.
4. It’s not just the PET, PP, PU, PTT, PLA - it’s also the Toxic Fiber Treatments
The concern however, is that many fabrics - natural and synthetic - are treated with various Fluorocarbons (PFCs) to provide water/stain proofing, fire retardant or other properties. When these fibers shed - both natural fibers and plastic fibers - they carry those PFCs with them.
These are then ingested by humans, directly through inhalation etc. or indirectly through tainted food and water sources. The harmful impact of these chemicals in microplastics, on Arctic populations has been studied extensively.
The apparel sector is aware of the problem. Two groups of PFCs: PFOA and PFOS, are largely being replaced by Patagonia and others, because, as they put it: “ PFCs are extremely effective at repelling water, but because of their impact, we’re in the process of eliminating them completely from the clothing we make.”
Clearly we all agree that these treatments are toxic and unsustainable, so we would expect the Higg MSI to reflect this, right?
Wrong.
The Higg is cradle to gate, so since these toxic impacts occur downstream in fabric use and disposal, they are not included in the MSI score. Indeed, if you look at the MSI for polyester for example the most that waterproofing etc seem to add to the total impact is about 5 per kilo.
Or compared to raw silk's impact of 641.5 per kilo - peanuts.
It seems incredible that Patagonia, Nike and others are marking themselves top of the class for sustainability, whilst slapping toxic chemicals onto their products. Meanwhile desperately poor silk farmers are heavily penalised and denied a market for their products, for allegedly using too much water and manure. But that is the glory of cradle to gate .
And as if that was not enough, since some cotton fibers have been found to contain PFAs/PFCs etc. and that is harmful, the claim is even being made that this means natural fibers are inherently harmful too.
If the PFC/As etc are there, it is because the billion dollar fabric and fashion brands put them there. It has absolutely nothing to do with cotton cultivation. To attempt to punish the poorest people on the planet for this by labeling raw cotton “harmful” as a consequence, is a travesty.
But I digress, to return to the topic of nano and microfiber pollution, not only have none of the concerns around these made their way into the Higg, but we are still fed reports suggesting there is something unknown and unquantifiable about the whole thing:
“Carry Somers, the Fashion Revolution co-founder who is joining the sailing expedition (for 2000 miles, Galapagos-Easter Island), aims to use the data to help fashion enterprises identify ways to reduce their contribution to microfibre pollution. She will provide the data to H&M, which will partially fund her trip; Patagonia; and others that have expressed interest.”
Seriously? In reality, the first major study on the issue - linking marine accumulation of microplastics to clothing was published in 2011. The lead ecologist concerned - Mark Browne - reached out to prominent clothing brands including Patagonia and Nike, seeking partnerships to try to determine the flow of synthetic fibers to the ocean, and to help develop better textile design to prevent the migration of toxic fibers into water systems.
Neither Patagonia, nor Nike were interested.
In 2016 Patagonia did finally fund a study, with a group of Masters students at the Bren School in California. This study confirmed earlier findings on the level of pollution; it discovered that aged jackets shed higher masses of fibers; and it concluded: “Unfortunately, there are no current alternatives to synthetic materials that provide the same performance qualities so mitigation of microfiber pollution is a more reasonable approach than outright bans.”
Which raises two questions:
1. Why are Patagonia pushing resale and repurposing of polyester jackets etc.as a major step towards sustainability, if the older the jacket is, the more fiber it sheds?
2. Where is the evidence that “there are no current alternatives to synthetic materials”?
This claim is repeated in a 2017 report by yet another GNOP The Ellen MacArthur Foundation (total income £11.5 m in 2018). “ A New Textiles Economy: Redesigning Fashion’s Future” - 150 pages, funded by C&A:
“Plastic-based fibres represent 60% of the clothing market today and it is unrealistic to assume that these could all be eliminated from the material stream in the medium term, as they deliver properties which cannot currently be replicated, especially for technical and high performance clothing”
Are they really suggesting that 60% of today’s apparel is technical clothing with minimum performance standards?
Astonishingly the MacArthur report laments:
“Action to address the issue of microfibre release has been slow to date. Despite the growing awareness and evidence base, no changes in material choices or garment production are yet being seen at scale.”
And goes on to claim:
“For example, outdoor clothing brand Patagonia is investing in research to increase understanding of the sources of these fibres, the consequences that they might have,
and the potential solutions”
To me it is incomprehensible that the authors could state all this without apparently noticing that the main reason for “no changes in material choices or garment production... yet being seen at scale” is precisely because Patagonia, along with almost everyone else funding the report, adheres to the Higg ranking. Why would brands switch away from polyester if it is, as Higg claims, the world’s most sustainable fiber?
It is also baffling that they would suggest that we must wait for the fruit of Patagonia’s research when the scientific community itself - as embodied in the EURATEX CIA report - is urging mitigation. And indeed, when the gold standard for the management of environmental problems is that precautionary principles are invoked and whenever information is inadequate, decisions should always favour the environment.
But then again, if you are wondering how many of the World’s leading universities’ departments of marine ecology, textile engineering, climate science, development economics, and agronomy worked on conceiving “A NEW TEXTILES ECONOMY”, the answer is none. Indeed, in a recent discussion on microfibers Mark Browne told me “we approached Ellen MacArthur but they were not interested in a scientific evaluation of this problem at the time”.
The question I think we all need to ask is : Why Not?
5. The Higg uses best practice LCAs to evaluate synthetic fibers when globally, most are not actually produced under best practice conditions.
The SAC use 2011 data, from European production facilities, to estimate global polyester impact:
“Data are based on the average unit process from the Eco-profiles of the European plastics industry and extrapolated to represent a global average production scenario. Average data for the production of amorphous PET out of ethylene glycol and PTA.”
But since 94% of global polyester production actually comes from Asia, how representative can European production really be?
India’s Reliance Industries claim “We are the largest producer of polyester fibre and yarn in the world, with a capacity of 2.5 million tonnes per annum” A quick Google of Indian news reveals a steady stream of complaints, fines, even deaths as a result of failings in various Reliance facilities. Indeed, according to Quartz, Mukesh Ambani, Reliance’s major shareholder, is Asia’s richest man and managed to pay off $21 Billion of debt, in just 2 months,” in the middle of a global pandemic”.
Meanwhile, the LG Polymers Vizgaz Leak of May 7, 2020 - in which both people and animals died, and hundreds were hospitalised - once again drew attention to the lack of robust safety precautions and oversight in the Indian petrochemical industry, for which India’s Business Standard, gave the following explanation:
“LG Polymers is part of a powerful industry association and lobby group called the Chemicals and Petrochemicals Manufacturers Association, which includes other polystyrene and petrochemical product manufacturers like Reliance Industries, ONGC, DCM Shriram, Chemplast, GAIL and Finolex.”
As for Viscose/Rayon fabric, Higg rate this impact at 62 per kilo. dropping to 51/kilo if you source Viscose Staple Fibre from BIRLA, India. This is based on data submitted by Birla, which seems astounding when yet another quick google reveals countless reports of illegal discharge at Aditya Birla (AB) plants in India and indonesia. AB is, of course, an SAC member - Indeed Aditya Birla is on the SAC’s Board.
6. So Who’s Checking?
As outlined in the first section, the initiatives that currently dominate the apparel sustainability sector were all set up by and for the fast fashion/athleisure industry. So who is checking that their claims are not biased in favour of the fast fashion/athleisure industry?
The answer appears to be nobody.
The 2019 SAC report “Higg Materials Sustainability Index (MSI) Methodology” suggests a close relationship with Harvard Extension School (HES) or “Harvard—extended to the world for every type of adult learner. We serve students seeking part-time, online courses and nonresidential programs to advance their career or pursue an academic passion. Our degrees and certificates are adorned with the Harvard University insignia”
HES lecturer Gregory A. Norris provided the 2016 review of The Higg MSI Methodology attached to the SAC report - and found it satisfactory. The problem here is twofold:
1. As discussed in my 2018 piece for Apparel Insider “Can you Count on a Critical Review” this was not an academic review but a business transaction. So, if the budget allocated for the review is insufficient to cover detailed analysis by the reviewers, there will be no detailed analysis.
And
2. Even the most sophisticated of models with the most advanced methodology is no better than its base data. If the data you input is inaccurate your model will be too. A commonly used shorthand for this amongst analysts is gigo - garbage in, garbage out.
Did Mr Norris’s contract include payment for a detailed analysis of the base LCAs?
No it did not.
He was only reviewing “ the July 20, 2016 version of “The Higg Materials Sustainability Index Methodology” report; an Excel workbook titled “Process Review July 2016t.xls”; and other details of the method and approach as communicated via web meetings with Cash East, of Pre Sustainability. “
He states:
“As specified on page 7 of the report, the choice has been made to use the following secondary sources for the Higg MSI launch: Ecoinvent versions 3, PlasicsEurope, GaBi, JRC European Commission, and literature. In general these choices are strongly supported by this review”
Hmm “In general” - so not a wholehearted endorsement.
Norris is enthusiastic about the Higg use of Ecoinvent version 3, and that is the source for the Higg MSI on PET, but as noted above, the Ecoinvent score used by Higg is for European polyester when 94% of the global supply actually comes from Asia, and appears to be produced in a far less environmentally friendly manner. Moreover, neither the score for Elastane/Spandex, nor that of cotton (organic or conventional), nor that of Silk, nor Alpaca, nor Wool, have the Ecoinvent database as a primary source. So in deciding whether the Higg is gigo or not, Mr Noriss cannot help us.
Earlier this year Jason Kibbey, CEO of Higg, made the following statement:
“There’s a third-party gatekeeper, and this is best practice for LCA methodologies to keep them free of influence. Tom Gloria at Harvard is our gatekeeper, he’s a well-known LCA expert who reviewed the data for soundness before it entered the MSI”
I reached out to Mr Gloria on three separate occasions to see if this statement was correct and more specifically to ask:
1. Since the Thinkstep LCAs are, it seems, all that the Higg has, how can the SAC be justified in claiming that Cotton fiber, conventional production, has an impact of 60.6 per kilo, but Cotton fiber, organic, has an impact of only 11.2. When, as I pointed out in my November 2018 article for Apparel Insider, those studies do not substantiate that claim.
And
2. How the impact of silk per kilo can be 681, when that of polyester is only 44.
Unfortunately, Mr Gloria did not reply
Conclusion:
As The Ellen MacArthur Foundation study states: “Microfibre pollution presents potentially significant reputational risks for retailers”
Indeed.
The jury is still out, but for brands and manufacturers it is a question of potential liability - reputational liability, possibly even financial liability - as a result of their use and promotion of the Sustainable Apparel Coalition and its Higg Index
As discussed here, and further elaborated on in my companion pieces Silk Revisited and The Use and Misuse of LCAs, it appears that the Higg MSI favours polyester and other fossil/factory fibers, by design.
If that is the case, any brand or initiative using and promoting the Higg, from Patagonia and Nike to Global Fashion Agenda and Boston Consulting, is actively promoting a fiber choice that may soon be seen as harmful - possibly even demonstrated to be so. In so doing, it is moreover failing to observe the precautionary principle. That is a significant potential liability.
Were I a corporate lawyer for any one of those entities, I would be attempting to mitigate this risk as soon as possible by:
a) publicly stating targets and attainment, for reduction in consumption of polyester, PP, PU, PTT, PLA etc
And
b) distancing all company operations from the SAC and the Higg MSI