How you can help with the oil spill clean up efforts

In the past weeks, I’ve watched in horror as the news showed images covering the oil spill. My feelings have gone from outrage, to disgust, to outrage again, to depression, and finally, uselessness. We’re told that all we can do is sit back and wait for the US Coast Guard and BP to come up with a solution.  But according to the latest comments from BP, it could take weeks or months before the leak is fixed. Meanwhile, the oil slick gets bigger, and the Gulf ecosystem gets worse. Tonight, I learned of a way, a small way, that we – as individuals – can help…

Help contain the oil spill by cutting your hair.

That’s right. Cut your hair and donate it.

The reason why this is a good solution is because hair is very absorbent for oil. If you want to test this out, go a few days without washing your hair and notice how oily your hair gets. There are thousands of tiny scales on the hair shafts that attracts and locks in the oil.

Apparently, this concept has been used before. Back in 2006, the Philippine government conducted a nationwide drive to amass tons of hair to absorb the more than 50,000 gallons of oil from a tanker leak. Inmates in Philippine prisons shaved their heads and chests, and hair salons sent the hair clippings from their shops.

There is an organization called Matter of Trust located in San Francisco that is collecting hair to make hair mats to send to the gulf coast. They will collect your hair and stuff it into nylon stockings to create a “boom”.

According to Matter of Trust, “The US has over 300,000 hair salons and each cuts an average of a pound of hair per day. Groomers usually cut 3 pounds per day!”

There are scattered nail salons nationwide that have already signed up to participate in this drive and send in their clippings, with more signing up every day.

And not just human hair. Pet hair works too. Petco recently announced that they will be sending their grooming clippings to Matter of Trust to aid in creating more booms to soak up the oil. According to Petco, they expect to ship about a ton of pet hair a day.

So if you were planning on getting your hair cut or your pet groomed, find out whether your salon is participating in this drive. If so, rest assured that you are doing something to aid in the cleanup of the oil spill.

UPDATE (May 17, 2010): Thanks to one of our commentators, we’re updating our post to include more information on how you can individually donate.

Because of the overwhelming response that they’ve been getting, they cannot answer our individual calls or accept our individual donations. However, they set up a system where, if you register, then they will send you the address to mail your hair donations. It looks like there are four locations, all located in Florida, but your specific location to send in the donations will be based on the letter that your state begins with.

You can go here to sign up: http://www.excessaccess.com/

I signed up and within a couple hours received my second email listing the addresses.

Alternatively, if you don’t want to register, then you can check your local hair salon or dog groomer to see if they’ve registered. I’ve heard that more and more businesses (including alpaca farms) are signing up to help out, so chances that you find one are likely.