don't replace it if it still works. that would completely defeat the intent of being environmentally friendly. getting rid of it entirely just makes it someone else's problem. it will still exist somewhere and still be breaking down.
if it's breaking down and needs to be replaced anyway because it's a decade old then ignore me lol.
Patagonia is good as long as it's not a Goretex. There's also Vaude which is really ahead when it comes to environmentally friendly designs. I think RR is another one.
You will always need to reapply the DWR layer every now and then depending on your use. Most people use Nikwax.
Not everything can be or needs to be biodegradable.
We don't need biodegradable houses. The wires we use in all of our electronics can't be biodegradable.
But- we can find ways to recycle those materials.
So I would say that the thing to say is that biodegradable or recyclable everything is usually better. Even then, though, some things don't fit those categories. There are all sorts of medical things that get implanted in human bodies (stents, for example) that can't be biodegradable and also won't be recycled unless we really change the way we think of our dead relatives.
In the interest of being terse, I was letting "unless you explicitly need it not to biodegrade" do a lot of the heavy lifting for those particular cases.
