SAN FRANCISCO – The Sustainable Apparel Coalition is stonewalling questions about new research which raises serious question marks about the Higg MSI tool and its dependence on out of date and unrepresentative LCA data. The report was published by UNFCCC Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action and saw researchers crunch data from 35 LCA cotton studies. They found there is a lack of transparency regarding the background life cycle inventory (LCI) data used to model LCAs while in many cases, “there is also a lack of transparency regarding the methodological assumptions applied while undertaking the LCA.”
“The existing LCA research conducted on cotton fiber production more often reports results as global averages and lacks regionality. For example, databases such as Higg MSI, provide scores for global averages of cotton production,” states the report.
The SAC, which claims to be a supporter of transparency – transparency is one of the four pillars of its recently announced strategic plan – is not responding to questions about the findings of the report. Meanwhile, it’s members such as H&M and Zalando are already trialling the use of Higg tools in a consumer facing environment.
The UNFCCC report adds: “LCA data cannot be used to determine the environmental performance of one cotton type over another and it is inappropriate to compare LCA results across the seven cotton types assessed in this report.”
So what did we ask the SAC? Firstly, the UNFCCC report states unequivocally that LCA data should not be used to determine the environmental performance of one cotton type over another and that it is inappropriate to compare LCA results across different cotton types. The Higg MSI is drawing on cotton LCA data that does precisely this and, by doing so, gives organic cotton – for instance – significantly lower environmental impact than conventional cotton.
We asked whether SAC be updating the Higg MSI to reflect these findings.
The SAC did not respond.
The UNFCCC report suggests most LCAs mistakenly allow manure to be burden-free, which is of major significance for organic cotton production and environmental impacts. Again, this means the Higg MSI is giving organic cotton a deceptively low environmental impact.
We asked whether SAC will be updating Higg MSI to reflect this issue.
The SAC did not respond.
The researchers say that existing LCAs are not effectively capturing the geographic variability of feedstock production and that we cannot rely upon them to accurately measure and compare polyester’s environmental impact. The Higg MSI is doing exactly this. We asked whether SAC will re-evaluate polyester’s score on the Higg MSI given that, if the recommendations of this report are to be believed, it is clearly unsafe?
The SAC did not respond.
The UNFCCC report states that LCAs capture a point in time, don’t account for variations in geography and climate and should not be used for comparison purposes (as the Higg MSI does).
In fact, the Higg MSI is underpinned by LCA data which compares different fibre types. With the above in mind, we asked where does it go from here? We asked the SAC whether there will be a complete overhaul or will the findings of the seminal UNFCCC report be ignored?
The SAC did not respond.
