> Clothing industry has somehow gotten by unscathed during all the environmental awareness that has spread in the past 20 years. I am pretty sure clothes are the #1 cause of the microplastics that have inundated the ocean and our water supply.
Surprise surprise, it has actually been studied. One recent review article of the field:
From figure 2b) we can see that while microplastics from synthetic fibres are certainly an issue, they are far from #1. Dwarfed by tires, paint, and macroplastics (large plastic pieces thrown away slowly grinding down into microplastics e.g. by wave action).
Pretty sure PP was referring to mainstream criticism and concerns which tend to be about plastics in foods, etc. but less acknowledgement of the problem of fast fashion switching from cotton to plastic based textiles.
Surprise surprise, it has actually been studied. One recent review article of the field:
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adl2746
From figure 2b) we can see that while microplastics from synthetic fibres are certainly an issue, they are far from #1. Dwarfed by tires, paint, and macroplastics (large plastic pieces thrown away slowly grinding down into microplastics e.g. by wave action).