• Allbirds began working on this shoe in 2022 with the aim of introducing a shoe with a net-zero carbon footprint.
• After a year of research and development, the shoe is now available in selected stores in cities like Tokyo, London, and New York.

Allbirds, a California-based sustainable footwear company, has rolled out its first net-zero carbon shoe.

The footwear company's new product, the M0.0NSHOT Zero, has a net-zero carbon footprint, which balances out the carbon emissions produced during its manufacturing.

The company uses carbon-negative materials in its shoes. For example, it sources regenerative wool from New Zealand’s Lake Hawea Station. The farm adopts sustainable practices, including regenerative farming methods, to capture more carbon from the atmosphere than it releases, which then helps in reducing the shoe's environmental impact.

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Aileen Lerch, Director of Sustainability, Allbirds, added: "We’re incredibly proud to bring M0.0NSHOT Zero to market, but we also recognize that hard work is still ahead for all of us to ensure this world’s first is not the world’s last.

"We see a real opportunity for the fashion industry to be an engine for innovation and inspiration in the climate fight. Solutions exist today, many of them all around us in the natural world, if we would step boldly into the pursuit of progress over perfection at scale.”

Allbirds has been in the business for decades, providing more sustainable footwear. The company designs the shoes with the use of more regenerative wool in mind. It uses regenerative wool extensively in shoe production, wrapping it around the upper and midsole to give it a modern and elegant appearance.

READ MORE: Top 10 Examples of Circular Fashion

The company is known for its minimalist designs and has also shared an open-source toolkit, where all information related to materials and techniques used in shoe production is available. It contains details regarding bio-based midsole foam, methane-capture bioplastic, and carbon-negative packaging, encouraging other businesses to adopt sustainable footwear practices and helping them in their transition to more sustainable fashion.

Jamie McLellan, designer, Allbirds, said: "M0.0NSHOT Zero is the ultimate pursuit of product purity, stripping away everything superfluous to allow the wool to be the hero.

"We needed to find ways to use more regenerative wool to help us counter other more stubborn parts of the carbon equation. As a result, we used wool to wrap the entirety of the upper and the midsole, giving the shoe a modern and monolithic look that feels fitting for footwear of the future.”

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Source: Allbirds