How many combs/brushes do you have? For wet hair, for untangling knots, for styling… Many of us buy new combs for a new look, color, pattern and throw away the ones we don’t use, creating piles of waste. Especially brushes, even if you throw them in the yellow bins thinking that they will be recycled, the small pieces they contain will not allow this.
However, you can compost combs made of natural materials such as wood or bamboo at the end of their lifetime and prevent waste. Moreover, due to their natural structure, wooden combs prevent electrification in your hair and help it grow easily.
As part of the Plastic-Free July 2024 events, IMU Sustainability Student Club collaborated with Groomed to encourage people to use more sustainable alternatives to the plastic combs and brushes they use for personal care, many of which are not recyclable. To this end, students from the Sustainability Student Club and our Sustainability Office team visited the offices and social spaces at Göztepe North Campus on July 18, 2024 to provide information about the resource use, water consumption and environmental pollution caused by the production and use of plastic combs and brushes presented eco-friendly and compostable combs made from lemon tree to our campus community members. Thanks to this collaboration, a total of 25 campus communities stopped using plastic combs and brushes and received biodegradable lemon tree combs free of charge. In addition to our campus community, in order to raise awareness in the public, 3 more people received biodegradable lemon tree combs as a result of the information and giveaway on the social media accounts of the IMU Sustainability Student Club and the Sustainability Office on the same day.
During the event, the academic advisors of the project emphasized to all participants that natural resources are consumed during the production of plastics and the consequences of this situation now and in the future. It was emphasized that plastic brushes cannot be recycled due to the small parts they contain, so that the consumption of these products not only consumes resources but also generates a large amount of plastic waste. On the other hand, due to the harmful microplastics they contain, these products pose a health risk to humans and cause hair electrification, leading to hair breakage and hair loss.
Groomed, which sponsored the event, underlined that microplastics contained in plastic combs can easily enter the body through the scalp. On the other hand, they stated that electrification, which is an important issue in hair care, shortens the life of the hair. Company officials reminded that plastic combs are thrown away due to the difficulties in the recycling process and have negative effects, especially environmental pollution, and emphasized that compostable and environmentally friendly wooden products do not produce static electricity and help the hair to stay tidier and smoother and are quite long-lasting.
With this social responsibility project carried out jointly by the IMU Sustainability Club and Groomed, 0,6 grams of plastic waste was prevented from being generated and this waste from remaining in nature for 450 years. By preventing this amount of plastic waste, 8 kg of greenhouse gas was prevented from being released into the atmosphere. Thus, by reducing the amount of plastic waste in our campus areas, in addition to contributing to our University’s zero waste project, it also contributed to reducing people’s environmental footprint.
The “Plastic-Free July” social responsibility project, which has been managed by IMU Sustainability Office since 2022, was carried out by IMU Sustainability Club this year. The academic consultancy of the project was undertaken by Res.Asst. Ayça ÇELİKBİLEK from IMU Sustainability Office team, who is also the academic advisor of IMU Sustainability Club, the club president Res.Asst. Furkan ERUÇAR and Lect. Zehra SAVAN.
Within the scope of the 2024 activities of the “Plastic-Free July” project, IMU Sustainability Club (IMUSUS) invited people to challenge them to remove a single-use plastic product they use in their daily lives every day for a month and step into a plastic-free life. During the challenge, environmental awareness was raised by providing information about the waste generation and environmental pollution caused by these plastic products every day through social media accounts. Following each of these informative social media posts, people were presented with sustainable alternatives with natural ingredients and packaging that do not produce plastic waste, which they could use instead of that plastic-containing product. IMUSUS also collaborated with 18 companies in Turkey and the world that are pioneers in sustainability and have sustainability labels in order to carry this awareness to consumer behavior. Thanks to this cooperation, on certain days of the challenge, with the sponsorship support provided by the companies, sustainable products were presented to both our students and staff and the public in order to create a new behavioral change in their daily lives. Thus, while enabling people to take the first step towards a plastic-free life, it also contributed to reducing the amount of single-use plastic waste and the environmental footprint of our campus community.
“Plastic-Free July” movement has been celebrated around the world since 2011, challenging people to eliminate single-use plastic products from their lives by raising awareness about plastic pollution and the amount of plastic they use.
