Coal’s Out for Fashion. Are Some Alternatives Worse?

As world leaders, industry executives and civil society groups from 200 countries descend upon Dubai this week for the United Nations climate talks, discussions about the future of fossil fuels are likely to be as fraught as they will be frustrating.

“We are living through climate collapse in real-time,” António Guterres, the UN secretary-general, told COP28 delegates on Thursday morning. “This year has seen communities around the world pounded by fires, floods and searing temperature—and the impact is devastating. Record global heating should send shivers down the spines of world leaders. And it should trigger them to act.”

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The fashion industry is grappling with its own climate tipping point. Its continued reliance on dirty coal and petrochemical-derived materials, environmental activists say, have always been one of the biggest “elephants in the room,” particularly with yarn spinning and textile dyeing and processing making up more than half of the sector’s emissions.

But instead of transitioning to renewable energy alternatives such as wind or solar, brands and retailers like Gap Inc., H&M Group, Zara owner Inditex, Nike and Puma, in their rush to mitigate the issue as signatories of the UN Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action and other similar agreements, are “embracing biomass boilers” as a problematic substitution, a new study from Stand.earth warned earlier this week.

It’s a growing trend, writ especially large when comparing companies’ past and present sustainability and climate disclosure reports, said Xixi Zhang, the Canadian advocacy organizaton’s research specialist. She noted that manufacturers in the Asian production hubs of Cambodia, China, India, Pakistan and Vietnam have all adopted boilers that gobble up organic substances derived from plants, animals and even microorganisms, with wood pellets, crop residues, rice husks, straw, bagasse and palm shells serving as popular options.

But biomass is far from the quick, cheap and low-carbon fix that brands are longing for, Stand.earth’s report said. Scientists have brought those claims into question by pointing out that the inefficiency of burning wood for energy releases more carbon dioxide per unit of energy than coal or gas, resulting in an uptick in emissions at a time when they need to drastically come down.

“The emissions from additional upstream logistics, which are often overlooked in carbon accounting, cumulatively enhance the overall carbon footprint of the fashion industry value chain and exert long-term impacts on the environment,” Zhang said.

Other problems stemming from the surge in biomass boilers can include deforestation, ecosystem degradation, biodiversity loss and land resources competition. One 2021 survey found that the Cambodian garment industry sends an average of 562 tons of forest wood, much of it illegally harvested, up in smoke every day or 205,130 tons each year, with the actual number likely higher due to the number of non-responses. This equates to the equivalent of 810 to 1,418 hectares of forest every year.

Incinerated garment waste is another popular feedstock in the Southeast Asian nation, and not only for the garment sector. In a paper published earlier this month, the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (LICADHO) said that pre-consumer waste belonging to Adidas, C&A, Disney, Gap, Lululemon, Primark, Under Armour and others was being used as cheap fuel for brick kilns, contributing to child labor and debt bondage and exacerbating respiratory problems.

“The continued burning of garment waste in Cambodian brick factories is hurting brick factory workers, children, communities and the environment,” Naly Pilorge, LICADHO’s outreach director, told Sourcing Journal. “This shameful practice has been publicly documented for years, and it is shocking that international garment brands have failed to end it for good.”

Particulate emissions from burning biomass have similar cause for concern, Stand.earth said. Studies have documented the deleterious effects that burning crops in India, palm fiber and shell in Malaysia and fuelwood in Cambodia have had on the health of workers and local communities. Just as critically, it said, the use of biomass boilers is delaying a shift to greener energy sources.

“Biomass boilers usually have a lifespan of approximately two decades,” Zhang said. “The adoption of biomass boilers will lock the fashion sector into a counterproductive strategy, impeding urgent climate action and the shift to renewable energy in this sector.”

Brands like H&M and Inditex say that they’re focusing on electrification paired with sourcing of renewable electricity, but that biomass has a temporary role to play where barriers to sourcing renewable electricity and unreliable grid connections make this difficult. They also say that they warn their suppliers that some sources of biomass can result in environmental and social harms that outweigh their benefits, meaning that it’s important to source biomass with the lowest risk of adverse impact, either supported by certification or from agricultural waste.

Puma added that it seeks the development of a common biomass guideline that doesn’t lead to deforestation or air pollution. “As the demand for trusted and sustainable sources of renewable energy increases so does the need to ensure our suppliers are equipped with knowledge and understanding about biomass,” a representative said.

Regarding LICADHO’s report, Adidas and C&A said that they have strict environmental policies in place for their upstream supply chains and that they closely monitor their suppliers for any mishandling of textile waste. A spokesperson from Primark said that the retailer condemns any harmful practices of garment disposal and that it is investigating the allegations. The other brands named did not respond to requests for comment.

“Brands cannot shirk responsibility for their own waste,” Pilorge said. “They have to take responsibility for their entire value chain and leverage their commercial power and influence. Brands need to work with and pressure their supplier factories and Cambodia’s Ministry of Environment to figure out how their waste is ending up at brick factories, and to make sure it stops immediately. Every brand sourcing from Cambodia is at risk of causing harm, as waste from dozens of brands has already been found in brick factories.”

On Nov. 8, dozens of environmental organizations, including Stand.earth, Sweden’s Protect the Forest and Indonesia’s Auriga Nusantara, wrote to the UN Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action urging it to “reevaluate” its signatories’ dependence on biomass as a “bridge fuel” to replace coal and update recommendations to members to exclude the use of on-site biomass boilers.

“While the commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions is commendable, we strongly believe that the UN Fashion Charter needs to re-examine the sustainability of using biomass as a ‘renewable’ energy source and stop legitimizing its use as an alternative to coal or gas,” they wrote. “Investing in biomass boilers is a distraction from the real solutions needed such as investing in wind and solar immediately and advocating for clean energy supply.”

Zhang said she found it interesting that one report from a Nike and Puma supplier in Vietnam mentioned that if used biomass instead of coal to produce the same amount of heat, the cost of energy would be at least two if not three times higher.

“Biomass is not the best way to replace coal,” she said.