Around the globe, nearly twenty-four billion, yes, billion, pairs of shoes are produced per year. Considering that nearly 50% of footwear is made from plastic or rubber, that’s quite a bit of future waste being produced annually, especially since some plastics can take nearly a millennium — literally, 1,000 years — to degrade. With eight billion metric tons of plastic waste hogging up space on Earth and damaging ecosystems, plus around an additional 350 metric tons of waste being added per year, experts have been looking for solutions to this problem before humanity ends up in the same situation as the people in Wall-E.

In the shoe industry, several brands’ development teams have come up with a brilliant solution to unnecessary plastic waste: recycling. 

Wow! How innovative! 

Well, really, it is; brands are bringing a new meaning to the phrase “those sneakers are trash” by using oceanic plastic waste to construct new pairs of sweet kicks.

The process is relatively simple. First, discarded plastic waste is gathered and removed from polluted coastal areas, often in the Indian or Pacific Ocean. The material is then crushed into small pieces. After the plastic has been crushed and cut, it gets cleaned to make it suitable for further commercial use. The plastic is dehydrated, and then further compressed, heated, and cooled into pellets. Producers can then use the pellets to develop their new shoes, which, by technical definition, are made of trash.

Several companies have utilized this process to develop new shoes made from recycled waste, such as Adidas, Sperry’s, and Neemans — saving a substantial amount of new waste from being produced while repurposing tons of old waste. 

Waste360 reports that Adidas can make a pair of shoes from eleven plastic water bottles. Nike has recently launched their own line of “trash” shoes called “Space Hippie.” The Space Hippie line is part of Nike’s goals for sustainable production, basing the concept off of the idea of intersolar space colonization “...where materials are scarce and there is no resupply mission.” 

Other companies are likely to follow Adidas and Nike’s lead. With major corporations making efforts to reduce their carbon footprint, there appears to be a bright future ahead for the fashion industry’s sustainability. 

But why should you wear recycled sneakers? Well, for one they are affordable. It’s cheaper to buy shoes made from old Dasani bottles than other “high-tech” materials athletic companies are pushing. In addition, they’re quite durable. I mean, I did say that plastic can take up to a millennium to biodegrade, right? Finally, by supporting sustainable fashion, you’re helping to save the environment for future generations. 

Can this new method of shoe production be a saving grace from plastic pollution? Probably not. But, it can greatly reduce the amount of plastic in our oceans as well as the plastic being added to landfills. 

So, the next time you’re in the market for a pair of new sneakers, consider buying a recycled pair. And if someone calls them trash, you can wear that label proudly.