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Your tea bag is likely releasing billions of microplastic particles, according to a new study
(www.foodandwine.com)
this post was submitted on 10 Jan 2025
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Get yourself a Guppy friend 🙂
So here's one (potentially major) issue with these bags:
While the bag catches a lot of microplastics, it is also leaving a lot more in your clothes because they were washed and contained in that bag. Where do those loosened microplastics on your clothes go? Either into the dryer (or outdoor line-dry) and expelled into the air, or you indoor line-dry your clothes and release more microplastics as you wear your clothes, breathing them in as you go about your day.
So people would essentially be paying $35 a bag to slightly improve wastewater at the expense of increased air pollution. If you indoor line-dry those clothes, you put your own health (and potentially the health of those around you) at greater risk.
The only non-polluting solution at this point is to not buy, wear, or launder any plastics-based fabrics. This includes polyester (a lot of people apparently are unaware of this).
Very interesting! The Guppy Friend is only for use in the washer, then the micro plastics are collected in the end of the bag, which you take out like lint in a dryer, but I still think your point is very valid! I dry all my clothes on a rack, and I've only got two fleece shirts (never getting one again, these are many years old), so it'll be thrown out when I no longer need it, but interesting point with the air particles!
Still, how much micro plastics are we not getting from plastic cups, bottles, door wrapping etc? Too much lol
I've read that using fleece/plastic clothing you already have is better for the environment than throwing them out, as the plastic is already there.
Yeah, that's the thing! It's near impossible to quantify not only the number and size of plastic particles being released, but also from what sources and how impactful it is on our health over time. There are so many variables involved.
I like the idea of the guppy bags, but honestly we need strict government regulation around the world to make a real difference in stopping plastic and PFAS pollution/contamination.
100% agreed on the restrictions. I don't think we can remove plastics by it's entirety, but we can definitively limit its use dramatically!
Certainly not an expert in the field here, but I'm not sure there's much environmental benefit from laundry bags of that sort, given the collected microplastics optimistically end up - Germany excluded - collated in your local landfill.
Guppyfriend even recommends sealing them in a container for disposal to ensure they don't blow around during waste collection and transport. This assumes of course that you can successfully transfer microplastic fibres from a large bag into a small container without spillage, but that's a matter separate from my conjecture.
Guppyfriend's FAQ
Source
While I don't think any particular company that makes similar bags is purposefully guilty of this, the marketing strategy used to promote these as environmentally responsible products just smells like greenwashing to me.
The ones I've had are also made of synthetic materials, and so eventually break down and begin releasing their own fibres.
Frankly, the true environmental benefit I see is something I've never seen advertised: I can wash groups clothes I want kept from intermingling in the same load and therefore run the machine half as often.
I'm in Denmark, where we burn our non-recyclabes, so I knowit won't end up in a landfill. Let's burn them planet instead, lol.
How did I read the whole page and still have no idea what the fuck it is? It's a laundry bag (?) that stops microplastics... And for all I know when I have sex with it, I supercharge it's nano particles to hunt plastics in the atmosphere with tiny lasers or something?
The whole site is a vacuous infomercial as far as I can tell.
And after your wash, take it out, like lint in a dryer. Been using it for 3 years myself, and came to market in 2015. It works.
Also, they DON'T state that it won't supercharge it's nanoparticles to hunt plastics in the atmosphere with tiny lasers if you have sex with it, so why not try?
I'm in!
Cool find, thank you!
No worries! Been using it for 3 years, and wow, does it capture a lot of plastics! I have a special septic tank (no idea what it's called in English) where all the water is filtered through multiple filters before ending up in the ground water, clean, and the Guppy friend definitively helps (for the few items I have left).