The linear business model of the textile industry leads to ever increasing amounts of textile waste. Much of this ends up in landfills or is incinerated, which has an immense negative impact on our environment and represents a loss of potentially valuable resources. With EU plans to collect and process this textile waste separately by 2025, there is a need for supporting infrastructure - facilities for coordinated and large-scale processing of textile waste streams are required for efficient collection and further processing.

EURATEX, who consists out of more than 100 business from across the European Union, proposed the set-up of five ReHubs near textile and apparel districts in Europe: Belgium, Finland, Germany, Italy and Spain have emerged as the ideal candidate hosts, chosen due to their existing and/or emerging recycling and local textile industry. It is foreseen that the ReHubs, made up out of existing and newly built installations, operate across borders in order to benefit many other European countries as well. A digital platform will coordinate the data and support the Hubs, companies and other operators in their material management.

Through improved management of textile waste streams, the creation of a new European market of secondary raw materials will be enabled, creating economies of scale profiting from circular economy. Waste-related costs will be reduced, knowledge on the recyclability and design of products will be generated and spread and the cooperation between makers and buyers in the industry value chain will improve.

The proposed ReHubs provide a large-scale and coordinated managing solution for textile waste streams in Europe, enabling efficient collection, sorting and recycling systems as well as the creation of many new jobs. 

Photo source: https://media.fashionnetwork.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1000,height=1000/m/d751/bf0e/cb96/2c0b/a355/e897/d3ba/ff4e/eb5a/a575/a575.jpg