Say you are interested in the environment

Communication about theenvironment has increasingly catastrophic overtones.
In a way (in many senses) we believe it is also why few read it and many avoid it.
There are a thousand reasons to feel guilty; we don’t need any more.
That said (really: we understand you), if you care about the environment, there are 3 things you can do to help it out, and they involve all shoes.

How long does a shoe take to degrade

Do you know how long it takes for a shoe to disappear by biodegrading?
Being made of plastic materials, you can imagine that it is a long time.
It is, but even we didn’t expect such a big number: 1,000 years.
A millennium to disappear completely!
More in detail: it takes 25 to 80 years to fall apart (let’s say an average of 50 years) and 1,000 to biodegrade completely, since plastics are the longest and most complex for bacteria to digest that can do so.

Use them for a long time, and then donate them

It’s true: shoes, particularly in their midsoles, lose their mechanical and elastic characteristics with time and use.
In other words, they are not as responsive and cushioned as they were on the first day of use.
However, it is true that they can have at least 3 lives: the first is when you run in them, the second is when you walk in them, and the third is when you donate them.
And if you don’t want to donate them when they now have very few miles left on them, you can decide to do so when they are no longer fit to run in (and to find out when, read here).
There are many nonprofits that collect them and bring them to those in need.
We point out just a few of them:

Foreigners

• Soles4Souls: is a global organization that collects shoes and clothes for distribution to people in need around the world.
  They have various collection points and collaborate with brands and companies to distribute the shoes.
• One World Running: is an international program that collects running shoes and donates them to people in need, especially in developing countries.
  It also promotes youth sports events.
• Samaritan’s Feet: is an organization that provides new and used shoes to children and adults in poverty around the world.
  They accept donations of running shoes for their global campaigns.

Italian

• Esosport: collects used sports shoes (including running shoes) and, in addition to donating them to those in need, recycles them to create playground and athletic track flooring. Find out how it works and how to donate your old shoes here.

Buy recyclable shoes

You can start having a smaller environmental impact even before you use your shoes: in fact, you can buy models that have these features:

1. Be made from recycled materials, in higher or lower proportions
2. Be made from recyclable materials.

In the case
1. you will help give another life to plastics that had already been used with other uses, and at least you will not use new, specially created ones.
In the case
2. you ensure that their environmental impact, once used, is as minimal as possible.
Many brands produce models that use recycled materials in varying percentages: adidas started first with Parley For Oceans and ocean plastics; Brooks is increasingly striving for the use of recycled materials and the reduction in C02 production in both production and distribution; Asics unveiled the Nimbus Mirai a few months ago, a model with which the Japanese manufacturer wants to close the recycling loop, from the plastics used to the recovery of spent models, which it takes care of itself.
On Running launched a model years ago that even includes a subscription that allows you to return your used shoe and get an identical but new one every few months.
It’s called Cyclon, and you can find all the info here.
Last chronologically is Hylo Athletics, which offers the Impact shoe with a corn-derived upper and a supercritical nitrogen injected compound with added bio-EVA to increase responsiveness.

Adopt responsible behaviors

Okay, we tricked you: it was supposed to be three tips that were only about running shoes but the third one is more general.
So general that we refer you to our series of articles on how to care for the environment by adopting sustainable and respectful behaviors.
Not just in running, but in many aspects of your life.
Sorry, we did it for the environment.

• The tricks to be more responsible while eating

• The tricks to being more responsible by cleaning

• The tricks to be more responsible by consuming

• Tricks for being more responsible in the bathroom

• The tricks to being more responsible by moving

(Via Six Minutes Mile)