Keeling Curve

Primary Project Category:

Project Summary / Description:

In 2000, MOT launched Clean Wave (CW), collecting hair, fur and fleece clippings to make petroleum spill clean-up booms. Naturally occurring substances, such as animal hair and wool provide a simple, cost-effective material to remove foam and surfactants associated with petroleum-based substances such as fuel, oils, grease, and fire retardants. 

CW produced booms have been used in response to two catastrophic oil spills: Cosco Busan (2007) in San Francisco Bay and BP Deep Water Horizon (2010) in the Gulf of Mexico. MOT responded rapidly to the BP spill by initiating a huge mobilization effort to gather waste fibers and make hair booms from nylon stockings for use in the cleanup.

Regions of Operations:

Best Estimate of GHG Avoidance/Reduction of This Project (Tonnes CO2 Equivalent/Year):

Impact on Underrepresented Groups:

Gender Diversity 
Co-founded by Lisa Craig Gautier and her husband Patrice Gautier, women have been represented in MOT's leadership since its inception. The Board of Directors is currently comprised of 50% women. CW‚ program is managed by a three-person management team, all of whom are women. 

Economic Diversity 
To date, MOT has primarily relied upon volunteers and/or part time casual labor for CW mat production. While this practice has contributed to MOT‚ workplace diversity in some respects, it has not provided optimal conditions to retain a stable workforce, challenging CW‚ capacity for a consistent pace of production or meeting anticipated future demand. 

Balancing workers‚ need to earn liveable wages in a very high-cost area like San Francisco poses significant challenges to nonprofits with modest budgets, such as MOT, as the following data suggests: 

- The California Family Needs Calculator, a project of the Insight Center, measures the minimum income necessary to cover all of a non-elderly (under 65 years old) and non-disabled individual or family‚ basic expenses ‚ housing, food, child care, health care, transportation, and taxes ‚ without public or private assistance, for each of the state‚ 58 counties (San Francisco is both a city and county within one jurisdiction). Per 2018 data, the minimum hourly wage needed by a single adult living in San Francisco (without children) is $26.45. CW production workers (aka felters ) are currently paid $18.00/hr which is approximately 67% of San Francisco‚ Family Needs wage (Insight Center, website https://insightcced.org/2018-family-needs-calculator.) 

- San Francisco is also one of more than 40 California city and/or county jurisdictions with a local minimum wage mandate. Under its Minimum Compensation Ordinance, the minimum hourly pay for non-profits is $16.50, which CW‚ current rate of pay for felters slightly exceeds. (Minimum Compensation Ordinance, Office of Labor Standards Enforcement, City & County of San Francisco, website https://sfgov.org/olse/minimum-compensation-ordinance-mco.) 

- Data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) provides occupational and wage estimates for all industry sectors. These sector classifications are standardized nationally, making it possible to compare employment and wage data within a state, as well as nationally. San Francisco is in the BLS San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward metropolitan statistical area. May 2018 Wage data for Production Workers/All Others , the job classification most closely aligned with CW felters, estimates the median hourly wage for such jobs in the statistical area as $13.99 - 77% of MOT‚ current rate of pay. (Bureau of Labor Statistics, May 2018 Occupational Employment & Wage Estimates, Website https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_41860.htm#51-0000.) 

Local economic conditions make it difficult to retain and grow the workforce needed to meet current and future demand, which impacts MOT‚ economic diversity as an organization. Despite these challenges there is value to CW continuing to produce mats at its San Francisco Eco-Hub. Doing so provides opportunities to dynamically engage and educate the public and MOT stakeholders about the inherent capacity of natural resources to mitigate the effects of climate change. 

MOT‚ interest in developing a network of geographically dispersed felting operations in addition to its existing Eco-Hub location in San Francisco‚ South of Market business corridor will help reduce carbon emissions generated in CW‚ supply chain, by locating production closer to fiber sources and end user locations. This approach will also have the potential to engage a significantly more economically diverse workforce as we engage stakeholders in other regions. 

MOT has increased its efforts to seek funds to support the development of this model, as well as to continue and expand operations at the San Francisco Eco Hub. For example, if funded, a recently submitted request in the amount of $75,000 to the Roy A. Hunt Foundation would support both strategies.

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