When life gives you lemons, make layers instead. You may not have thought much about it, but that next visit to the salon comes with a hidden cost: waste. Each year, about 810,000 tons of human hair waste is generated worldwide, according to new research from Yildiz Technical University. Since hair is predominantly keratin, when upcycling hair waste, it breaks down slowly, can overcrowd landfills, and is often burned for disposal, which releases greenhouse gases.

Yet, our tresses are surprisingly useful. Companies salvage trimmings from salons and upcycle them into a variety of agricultural products like biodegradable mulch, fertilizer and compost. By promoting a range of sustainable salon practices and mitigating the environmental impact of synthetic materials, these companies are fostering greener grooming and reducing landfill waste in a single snip.

Transforming Trimmings

Since their opening in 2020, Green Salon Collective has diverted over 225 tons of waste from the landfill, avoiding 14.2 tons of carbon dioxide emissions in 2025 alone, said Jess Rigg, operations and marketing manager at Green Salon Collective. The British company upcycles hair waste, hairdressing foil, aerosol cans, towels and color tubes from salons across the United Kingdom and the United States.

“We’ve been working to get as many salons involved as possible, finding new ways for the hair to be used, trying new projects, that sort of thing,” Rigg said, regarding upcycling hair waste. “We’ve been thinking about sustainability within the industry more generally and trying to support our salons to, yes, recycle, but also conserve water, conserve energy.”

Likewise, Barcelona startup Clic Recycle collects tons of hair from salons across Spain, Portugal, France and the Netherlands. It also encourages hairdressers to get involved with environmental events, like beach clean-ups, while supplying each salon with an impact report tracking its greenhouse gas emissions, water savings and sustainable development goals.

Once these companies receive and sort the hair, the locks are given a new life through upcycling hair waste. Clic Recycle upcycles hair into a variety of products, including biodegradable mulch. The mulch — a mixture of hair, industrial hemp and natural vegetable fiber — is used on farms, vineyards, parks and around rivers. Once in place, it provides a variety of benefits, such as decreasing soil erosion, weeds and herbicide use, said Valérie Itey, founder and CEO of Clic Recycle. Plus, it lowers irrigation needs by 40 percent or more and breaks down in three to five years.

Read the full article about reusing hair waste by Ruscena Wiederholt at TriplePundit.