TENCEL_REFIBRA_Leaflet_20190708.pdf

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This collection features a selection of inspiring examples of the circular economy, compiled in the context of the Switch to Circular Economy Value Chains programme (SWITCH).

Launched in 2020, SWITCH is a five-year initiative that assists EU multinational companies and their suppliers from developing countries to switch to more circular economy approaches and practices in three selected value chains: [Plastic Packaging](https://knowledge-hub.circle-lab.com/switchtocircular/search?collections=832%3D0&framework_elements__5=111), [Textile & Garments](https://knowledge-hub.circle-lab.com/switchtocircular/search?collections=832%3D0&framework_elements__5=99), and ICT and Electronics.

The overall objective of SWITCH is to support the “transformation towards a circular economy”, and to contribute to sustainable growth, low carbon and climate resilient development, decent jobs creation, and a safer, healthier and pollution-free environment.

SWITCH is co-funded by the European Union and the Government of Finland, and implemented by UNIDO, in collaboration with Chatham House, Circle Economy, and the European Investment Bank.
Learn more at www.switchtocircular.eu

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Switch to Circular Economy Value Chains

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Business case

Impact on the ease of innovation, and facilitating uptake of innovations

Innovation

Minimise waste through diversion: Instead of sending waste to landfill, it is redirected into other industrial processes for handling, treatment, recycling, recovery, or reuse in various forms. 

Minimise waste through design: At the outset of a process of project, plan and design such that there is zero waste or minimal waste during production, use, and at end of life. 

Minimise Waste (SDG12)

Reduced use and withdrawal of water and rate of recycling and reuse of water

Save Water (SDG6)

Reduced use of fossil fuel energy sources and/or increased use of renewable energy

Reduce Energy Consumption

Producing textile and leather products and processing them into apparel and accessories

Fashion and Textiles

Extracting and gathering wood through forestry and producing wood and paper products

Wood and Paper

Water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities

Wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles

Using bio-based materials such as bioplastics, mushroom-based materials, etc.

Alternative bio-based materials and inputs

Using materials that can be easily reused or recycled after use

Reusable, recyclable materials and inputs

Transforming waste products, materials for reuse within other industries

Open loop upcycling

Using waste materials that have been processed and recycled to produce new products within other industries

Using open loop recycled materials

Designing products that can easily breakdown and degrade in the environment

Design for bio-degradability

Make collected and sorted recyclables available for use by citizens, small businesses up to large scale industrial processes. 

Use recyclables

Other

VISION:
Raw materials are renewable, recyclable and safe, kept in continual circulation.

DETAIL:
Imagine a time when…the raw materials that are used to make things are sourced from existing products and regenerative agriculture, via carbon negative and climate neutral processes. Biodegradable raw materials are used for products with biodegradable end routes. Toxic chemicals have been washed out of the global materials pool, disposed of safely and replaced with beneficial alternatives. Virgin fibres made from fossil fuels have been banned, while secondary synthetic fibres, derived from what was already in the system, are kept in constant circulation as a resource. Circularity accounting methods, built on science-based metrics, help to manage a balanced system of resources, across all industries, and in line with the planet’s environmental limits.

Raw Materials and Planetary Boundaries

Impacts

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Industries

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Nace Sectors

The principles of a circular economy concern designing out waste, regenerating ecosystems and keeping items in use. Decoupling the economy from material flows—improving the rate of resource productivity faster than the economic growth rate—is also a consistent guide. By evolving with the growing number of applications of circular economy principles, and consolidating these strategies across thematic areas, Circle Economy’s Key Elements Framework (KE) renders the elements of the circular economy salient and serves as a basis to derive contextual strategies and interventions. 


The Framework consists of:
- Core Elements: Activities directly handling product or material flows; and uniquely,
- Enabling Elements: those that remove obstacles for core actors.


Key elements of the circular economy

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Circle Economy's framework of strategies and activities that define the circular economy

Urban Opportunities

It is 2050.  Full systems change has taken place. This wouldn’t have been possible without the immediate action and radical steps taken from 2020 onwards. Many targets had to be identified in the early 2020s and achieved by 2030 to ensure that the 2050 goal happened in full. A sense of urgency, turbo stakeholder collaboration, supportive government regulation and clear, data driven targets enabled the mindsets and systems change needed to transform to a fully circular textiles ecosystem.

A circular economics model underpins what we have created. It reflects and supports a living organism made up of makers, users and restorers, interacting across vibrant and interconnected networks. Checks and balances, alongside transparency and accountability, ensure a healthy system. Financial, environmental, and social metrics have the purpose of serving communities and the planet. There is shared ownership of profit and loss – across all three metrics – throughout the value chain.

This is what we’ve achieved over the last 30 years:

WCTD Themes

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Based on the work of [Bocken et al. (2016)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309699661_Product_design_and_business_model_strategies_for_a_circular_economy), the Four Flows Framework serves as a simple framework for managing resource flows in a circular economy by using less (Narrow), using for longer (Slow), using again (Cycle), and using clean, regenerative materials and energy (Regenerate).

These different principles of circular economy can be applied to our socioeconomic metabolism: we can design stocks like buildings, infrastructure, machinery, and vehicles to be rich resource mines for the future, and design manufactured goods and consumables to be cycled and made regenerative. Furthermore, the focus must also centre on getting more value out of fewer materials. Achieving the aims of a circular economy—minimising material use, regenerating the Earth, and preventing material losses—can be done through these four key strategies mentioned above.

Source: Circle Economy. (2023). *[The circularity gap report 2023](https://www.circularity-gap.world/2023)* (p.22). Amsterdam: Circle Economy. 

Four Flows Framework

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Lenzing – The Circular Fashion Partnership provides an efficient platform for Lenzing to contribute to a long-term, scalable transition to circular fashion. The cross-sectorial project has been initiated by Global Fashion Agenda, the leading forum for industry collaboration and public-private cooperation on fashion sustainability.By participating in the Circular Fashion Partnership, Lenzing proactively contributes to the development and implementation of new systems to capture and direct post-production fashion waste back into the production of new fashion products. In addition, the partnership seeks to find solutions for the COVID-19 related pile-up of deadstock and to engage regulators and investors around the current barriers and economic opportunities in Bangladesh. The initiative offers a substantial opportunity for Bangladesh to become a leader in circularity by scaling the recycling capacity in the country and generating more value from these waste streams.“In close cooperation with leading companies who attach particular importance to sustainability we aim to practice new business models for adopting more circular processes. Together we will facilitate a decrease in textile waste and increase the use of recycled fibers," explains Stefan Doboczky, CEO of Lenzing Group.As a frontrunner in sustainability, Lenzing aims to make textile recycling a process as common as paper recycling. Since the year 2017, its REFIBRA™ technology successfully combines the environmentally responsible lyocell technology with a closed-loop production process and the upcycling of cotton waste materials. While the fiber is currently available with 30 percent recycled textiles as a raw material, it is Lenzing’s vision to offer fibers produced with REFIBRA™ technology with up to 50 percent recycled content from post-consumer waste by 2024.Find out more about the Circular Fashion Partnership.






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Lenzing showcases new carbon-zero products at Intertextile Shanghai Home Textiles 2021, setting a new trend in decarbonized home textiles
 






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TENCEL™ brand delivers “True Carbon Zero” webinar in China to drive industry commitment to sustainability
 






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Lenzing unveils pioneering TENCEL™ Modal fiber with Indigo Color technology to help elevate sustainability in the denim industry
 






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Switzerland

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The Lenzing Group is an international group with its headquarters in Lenzing, Austria, and production sites in all major markets. Lenzing produces wood-based viscose fibers, modal fibers, lyocell fibers and filament yarn, which are used in the textile industry - in clothing, home textiles and technical textiles - as well as in the nonwovens industry. 

Lenzing

<p>With the launch of Lenzing’s REFIBRA™ technology in 2017, Lenzing has developed a new fiber based on cotton scraps and wood, the first commercially available chemically recycled cellulose fibers. The REFIBRA™ technology gives a second life to pre-consumer cotton waste from garment waste, which would have otherwise been sent to landfills, and upcycles it into brand new cellulosic fiber material for textiles. The fibers use 95% less water than conventional cotton, and are also certified as fully compostable and biodegradable, meaning that products made from it can revert back to nature.</p>

Lenzing: a new technology gives a second life to pre-consumer cotton waste 

Reduced green house gas emissions released into the biosphere

Reduce Emissions (SDG13)

<p>TENCEL™&nbsp;is Lenzing's flagship brand for textiles.&nbsp;Used for a variety of highly specialized applications, the benefits of&nbsp;TENCEL™&nbsp;fibers can be discerned instantly: Soft to the skin, smooth to the touch, luxurious in shine and flow.&nbsp;TENCEL™ branded lyocell and modal fibers are produced by environmentally responsible processes from the sustainably sourced natural raw material wood.</p>

Lenzing Tencel - textile fibers from wood

Lenzing produces wood-based viscose fibers, modal fibers, lyocell fibers and
filament yarn, which are used in the textile industry - in clothing, home
textiles and technical textiles - as well as in the nonwovens industry.
Lenzing's TENCEL® generation Refibra™ stands for "Reduce, Reuse and Recycle"
and is a new kind of fiber is made of recycled materials, promising reduced
reliance on natural raw materials. Refibra is a Lenzing fiber made from post
industrial cotton scraps and wood. It is the first cellulose fiber featuring
recycled material to be offered on a commercial scale. The fiber, which is
made in the Tencel production process, marks a milestone for Tencel and builds
on Lenzing’s reputation for leading environmentally friendly fiber technology.
To assure customers that their textiles are really made from Refibra, Lenzing
has developed an identification system, which can verify that Refibra was used
in the finished textile. This guarantees transparency in the overall
processing chain.

