Anne Veck Investigates:  Hair foils. Foiled Again!

You probably already know that aluminium, including hair foils,  is almost infinitely recyclable and globally, most of it is still in use after many, many years.

You may have seen suppliers advertising that their hair foils are made from recycled aluminium, with the wording leading the reader to believe that they are 100% made from 100% recycled aluminium.

There is at least one supplier in the UK who states categorically on their website that their foils are manufactured 100% from recycled aluminium. Keith has spoken to them and after some verbal squirming and wriggling, they admitted that this wasn’t the case.

The truth is that all aluminium colour foils are made from a mix of recycled and virgin aluminium because the thinness required is not achievable otherwise. The Aluminium Federation tell us that in theory it could be possible to create a closed circle process by which sufficient amounts of used foils were used to make new foils. But no one is doing this, so research project any one?

This important because most aluminium is made from bauxite mined in China, Australia, Brazil and Guinea. Rain forest and biodiversity destruction as well as human rights abuses and pollution can take place in some of these locations. So not ideal.

So what are alternatives? Plastic meche is one of course – but plastic is made from oil so not great. “Paper” meche such as Paper Not Foil may be the best option because its made from industrial waste (stone) from the construction industry. Re-usable and non toxic, so even if it ends up in landfill it doesn’t do much harm.

Green Salon Collective recommend aluminium foil over the “paper” option because of its amazing recyclability but to make this work you MUST have your used foils collected by them, Recycle My Salon, Full Circle or Salon Cycle (others may be available!). Otherwise it will end up in incineration or landfill because used foils cannot be recycled unless they are cleaned and most waste and recycling services do not do this. Apparently most hairdressers and salons just bin their used hair foils which is appalling and to be blunt, just plain lazy.

(The same applies to your colour tubes. After you have squeezed out the last drop, make sure they are recycled by one of the good guys above!)

For much more on all aspects of sustainability in hairdressing including links to download our tool kits, wizz over to here!

Thanks for reading! And remember, the 3 Rs: Reduce, re-use, recycle, in that order. The less waste the better. Sustainability saves you money because you use and buy less.
Bisous

Anne x