Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Soaking up oil spills one hair at a time


Did you ever think your hair could help save the environment after a destructive oil spill occurs? Phil McCrory, a stylist from Alabama sure did! After viewing CNN coverage of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, he began testing how much oil he could collect with the hair from his salon. After discovering hairs ability to efficiently and abundantly collect and contain petroleum spills, he invented the hairmat.

Matter of Trust, an ecological public charity that concentrates on manmade surplus, natural surplus and eco-education, picked up the invention and created a national effort to collect hair. Once word spread, thousands of salons started mailing their clippings in to help create oil spill hair mats. Salons collect an average of one pound of hair a day, which can be used to clean and contain spills instead of thrown away and wasted. Stylists are excited, and have been extremely supportive of the program. They are sweeping up their clippings, putting them in bags, and donating them.

So the next time you go to your favorite salon to have your hair cut, colored, shaved, dreaded, layered, or thinned make sure to ask your stylist where he takes your hair?

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