Mick Fanning and Rip Curl Go GREEN to support Enviroweek

Rip Curl announced a few weeks ago that former ASP world champion, Mick Fanning would surf in a new green wetsuit during the Billabong Pro Mundaka, in an effort to raise eco-friendly awareness for Enviroweek & the Rip Curl Planet initiative.  Fanning signed on as an Enviroweek ambassador this year, hoping to help spread their eco-message and raise funds for this year’s program.  “In Australia Enviroweek runs from October 11 to 17 and is all about improving environmental awareness, encouraging behavior change and raising funds for environmental charities. People can sponsor my Enviroweek mission and make a donation at Enviroweek.org  “When I joined forces with Enviroweek I spoke with Rip Curl about creating a green suit to wear at the Mundaka event to help get the message out there. They’d been developing on a new eco-friendly suit, so it worked out beautifully.” Rip Curl is Mick’s major sponsor and they also coordinates a host of eco-friendly initiatives under the slogan – Rip Curl Planet.  The green Rip Curl wetsuit features a new neoprene that uses non-solvent glues in the lamination process, resulting in a major reduction of chemicals polluting the air.

Approximately 800 tonnes of solvents currently evaporate into the air because of current neoprene laminating processes, so this development will be a huge improvement for the environment and will also benefit worker health.   “Wherever we can we are looking for ways to reduce any impact on the environment that our products may have,” said Mick Ray, Rip Curl Global Wetsuit Chairman.  “The laminating process has always been a particulary toxic one so this initiative of using non-solvent based glues is going to be massive in terms of improving working conditions in the factories as well as reducing the amount of nasty pollutants in our air.”
Rip Curl also runs a “Project Resurrection” program that sees Rip Curl recycle used wetsuits and production offcuts for re-use in other products.

Rip Curl is currently using recycled wetsuits in the production of travel bags and footwear, but the list will continue to grow in 2010.   You can read more information on Enviroweek can be found at http://www.enviroweek.org and get more insight on Mick Fanning at http://www.mickfanning.com.au.