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This collection was curated by the Circle Economy team from Knowledge Hub case studies for businesses, local and national governments around the world to find inspiration in practical examples of the circular economy. 

Visit the <a href="https://circle-economy.com" target="_blank">Circle Economy website</a> for more information and for more publications on the circular economy.

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Circle Economy

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DCTV

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This collection has been built by a community of passionate researchers, students, and industry professionals as part of <a href="https://worldcirculartextilesday.com/" target="_blank">World Circular Textiles Day</a> (WCTD). 


World Circular Textiles Day takes place every year on 8th October.  Our vision is to galvanise the collective ambitions and goals of people, organisations and businesses to reach a fully circular textiles world by 2050. Our mission is to provide a framework for circularity stakeholders to develop and deliver a collaborative, evolving roadmap and to chart circularity’s momentum annually from the 8th of October until 2050.

What does fully circular by 2050 mean?
- Shared textile resources, in the form of products and raw materials, are kept in **continual circulation**.
- Virgin resources are **replaced with circular materials**.
- Dignity, equity, and equality for the **people** involved in all parts of the circular value chain.

We need to know where we stand today to chart how to get to 100% Circularity by 2050. What circular activity is currently happening in the textiles and apparel industry, and where in the world is it happening? The WCTD Collection aims to answer this question by building the world’s largest digital library of circular textiles case studies. 

World Circular Textiles Day is proud to be supported by our 2022-23 Circular Hero Partners:
[Lenzing](https://www.lenzing.com/), [Texaid](https://retailsolutions.texaid.com/), [Bank & Vogue](https://www.bankvogue.com/), [Usha yarns limited](https://ushayarns.com/), [The Conduit](https://www.theconduit.com/), and [Asia Pacific Rayon](https://www.aprayon.com/en/)

## Want to contribute to the WCTD Collection? Sign up and add your circular textiles activities.





World Circular Textiles Day

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Business case

Impact on increased knowledge and understanding as a result of the case study

Increase Awareness

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

Innovation

Scalability

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)

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

Fashion and Textiles

Using waste materials that have been processed and recycled to produce new products within the same industry

Using closed loop recycled materials

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

Using open loop recycled materials

Working together with industry peers to engage in business activities or exploratory projects that advance the circular economy

Joint industry ventures, projects, pilots

Engaging in discussions with government bodies and policymakers to push for regulations that support the circular economy

Advocacy for circular economy policy

Participating in government programmes that support and advance the circular economy

Government programmes

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

Use recyclables

Solutions at all stages of the textiles value chain.

Zero Waste Textiles

Other

Impacts

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Industries

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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

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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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In a circular economy, suppliers and providers collaborate to optimise the lifetime of the assets they provide, either as a service or using different models that emphasise extended use over consumption. However, the circular businesses in operation today are often faced with accounting standards, such as reporting and valuation, that are based on linear principles and that do not reflect their economic reality. To transition to a circular economy, the mismatch between existing reporting and valuation standards, legislation, and circular business models needs to be addressed, and doing so requires a holistic, multi-stakeholder approach.

The Fibersort is a technology able to automatically sort large volumes of mixed post-consumer textiles based on fiber composition. These sorted materials are perfectly suited to become inputs for textile recycling processes, and commercialisation of the Fibersort will bring closed-loop textiles one step closer to reality.[embed]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2dYN59ax-I[/embed]A solution for the growing textile waste problem In North-West Europe alone, 4650 Kt of textiles are discarded every year. That is the equivalent of 600.000 elephants! Of these discarded textiles a meagre 30% is collected. Nearly half of these items are not suitable for re-wear and are currently downcycled, landfilled or incinerated. The Fibersort gives them a chance to become inputs for textile-to-textile recycling. The Fibersort technology is uniquely positioned to deliver two things. First, it reduces the need for virgin textile materials by providing feedstock more efficiently for textile-to-textile recycling. This will alleviate the environmental pressure of producing virgin materials. Second, it creates additional market value and business opportunities by making it economically feasible to sort textile excess (waste). Simon Smedinga, Operational Director of Salvation Army ReShare says: "The Fibersort machine offers a breakthrough that allows us to close the loop in textiles. The project partners have shown dedication and idealism and show that through chain collaboration a lot can be achieved. I am convinced that the Fibersort machine will bring the textiles industry big steps closer towards a closed looped system. " Getting the Fibersort technology ready for commercializationThis technology must be commercially viable to help transform waste into new resources. The Fibersort project partners Circle Economy, Valvan Baling Systems, Reshare, Procotex, Worn Again, and Smart Fibersorting are working with industry stakeholders to better understand end-markets for sorted textiles, optimise the machine and validate the business case. In September of 2019, the consortium will launch a commercially viable Fibersort process into the market and release reports to support the growth of this pivotal technology over time.Cyndi Rhoades CEO of high-value recycler Worn Again says: "The Fibersort will enable suppliers of post-consumer textiles to meet the feedstock specification for our process more efficiently than today’s sorting methods. The first results of the Fibersort are looking very promising. We are very optimistic that this innovation will help to provide advanced sorting capabilities for the new generation of textile to textile recycling technologies like ours and help the industry on its way to circularity."The Fibersort in ActionOn the 14th of March the Fibersort consortium extended an open invitation to the industry to come and see the Fibersort in action during a Demo Day. Performance information was shared with the industry for the first time, because the consortium knows that opening their doors and welcoming feedback and insight from the market is the best way to create lasting industry transformation. During Fibersort Demo Day the project partners also hosted workshops designed to increase attendees' understanding of the systemic issues around recycled textiles and collect valuable insights for the project. [hr][cta link="https://mailchi.mp/circle-economy/fibersort-signup"]Learn more about the Fibersort[/cta][hr]

    Textile inputs and PET plastic outputs Worn Again Technologies      This goes beyond recycling. Worn Again Technologies, headquartered in London, says it's developed a chemical process to turn used polyester and cotton clothing, along with PET plastic bottles and packaging, back into raw materials. The startup is working to scale up in the next couple of years, and see the pellets and pulp it creates spun back into shirts, pants and more. The company saw an investment last year of almost $6.4 million (U.S.), and has spent more than six years on research and development. Fashion retailer H&M has signed on, along with partners including Sulzer Chemtech, one of the world’s largest chemical engineering companies; Mexico-based Himes Corp., a garment manufacturer; Directex, a textiles producer, and Future Tech Lab, run by fashion investor Miroslava Duma. As the Grimm fairy tale goes, a girl was able to spin straw into gold in Rumpelstiltskin. Turning old clothing back into raw materials? "It's way too good to be true, but it is and it's coming, " says Worn Again CEO Cyndi Rhoades. Not only are the end products of Worn Again's process comparable in quality, they're competitive in price. That translates to an alternative to clothing made with cotton that's grown using lots of water, pesticides and land, and polyester made from oil byproducts. The alternative also is one that can be easily adopted to help transform the textile industry, Rhoades says. The inspiration: In 2015, about 55 million tons of polyester and cotton went into textiles worldwide. By 2030, that number is projected to increase by 63% due to population growth and other factors, according to various industry reports, Rhoades says. "We're going to need 90 million tons to satisfy demand," she said. Thankfully, existing textiles and plastic bottles that aren't being re-used are enough to satisfy that demand. Every year, about 53 million tons of textiles are buried in landfills around the world. And less than 1% of textiles around the world that are collected go back into making new textiles. With huge limits on today's recycling methods, like separating blended polyester and cotton that make up most textiles, Worn Again Technologies has worked to produce "virgin equivalent outputs."    "Essentially what we do is separate polyester and cotton, decontaminate everything, strip out dyes and finishes, and we are able to create or recapture a decontaminated raw material," Rhoades said. That amounts to polyester pellets and cellulosic pulp that can be turned into clothing like a virgin product, all done in an environmentally friendly, closed-loop process.     The Worn Again process can separate, decontaminate and extract polyester polymers and cellulose... [+] (from cotton) from non-reusable textiles, as well as plastic bottles and packaging, to go back into new products.  Worn Again Technologies    'Exciting, Pioneer Days' Having a process in place for creating new raw materials will incentivize collection, Rhoades says, and machines like Fibersort, a parallel technology, will help make the process more efficient. "So when we build a big plant ... suddenly, the potential for being able to divert textiles from landfills into a process that can actually generate revenue for a production plant and create a global commodity, it will be a huge shift in collection, infrastructure and what cities will be able to do," said Rhoades, originally from Ohio.    Rhoades says production plants using the Worn Again process are planned for the future; she won't say where but mentioned New York as an example of a location "at the heart or the source of the feedstock." The company plans to launch its first industrial demonstration plant in 2021. Collaborators and partners have been a key component, the CEO says. Rhoades and others at Worn Again Technologies aren't wearing clothing made from rejuvenated textiles just yet. She says seeing clothing available in stores is at least a couple of years away. "We have done all of the proof of concept work. What we're focusing on now is optimization of the process and the scaling of the technology." The goal is to license and built plants in the next 10 years. "It's just going to change everything. These are exciting, pioneer days." 

The accelerating consumption and disposal practices cause textiles entering the market to reach their end-of-use rapidly. In North-West Europe alone, around 4,700 kilo tonnes of post-consumer textile waste is generated every year.An average of 30% of post-consumer textiles is collected as a separate waste stream.In the best-case scenario,  these textiles are sold in the second-hand market both locally and internationally. In North-West Europe this average of rewearable textiles is around 64% of collected textiles.The remaining 36% is considered non-rewearable textiles due to their unsuitability for the second-hand market or the market saturation that second-hand clothing is currently facing. Almost all of these textiles are currently being downcycled, incinerated or landfilled. Accelerating consumption and disposal practices, coupled with lower quality clothes, leads this fraction of textiles to continue to grow.Nevertheless, 24% of collected textiles have the potential to be recycled, but currently are not. These textiles are mono-materials that are made of one or two fibre compositions.

 Shoppers are buying more clothes and discarding them faster than ever, a trend that is sending an increasing amount of textiles to the dump and propelling the fashion industry to search for new technology to recycle used garments. The growth of fast-fashion retailers like Hennes & Mauritz AB, Inditex SA’s Zara and Gap Inc. —each vying to deliver quicker and cheaper styles—has flooded the world with affordable clothing that is worn just a few times.  Globally, the number of garments purchased annually by the average consumer jumped 60% from 2000 to 2014, according to McKinsey & Co. The number of times an item is worn before it is discarded dropped 36% between 2002 and 2016, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, a U.K.-based nonprofit organization focused on cutting waste says. In the U.S., clothes are worn for around a quarter of the global average. Despite the buildup of used clothes, the technology to recycle old textiles into fiber to make new ones has remained embryonic, meaning clothes eventually end up in the dump or incinerator. Textiles in American landfills jumped 67.7% by weight from 2000 to 2015, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.  So far, companies have focused on improving collection of used clothes. H&M and Zara are rolling out in-store bins to collect garments which are then sold as secondhand clothing, largely to emerging markets, or turned into other products.  

       March 12, 2020 5:55AM ET   The Fibersort Consortium unveiled Thursday the market-ready version of Fibersort, a machine that automatically divides large volumes of mixed post-consumer textiles by fiber composition and color, allowing these materials to become consistently uniform inputs for high-value textile-to-textile recyclers. The technology, which has been several years in the making, employs near infrared-based technology to sift through… 

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© Fibersort Consortium/ Circle Economy.
Today, the Netherlands based Fibersort consortium is launching its market ready Fibersort machine, a cutting-edge automated sorting technology that aims to revolutionise textile-to-textile recycling of post-consumer textiles.  Fibersort, a Near Infrared (NIR) based technology, is able to categorise textiles in 45 different fractions based on their fibre composition and colour. The machine can sort approximately 900 kg of post-consumer textiles per hour, enabling a closed loop textiles solution.
Although the Fibersort machine will be officially launched on the 12th of March, the in-person Final Symposium has been cancelled today due to the current of the COVID-19 situation. Therefore, instead of an in-person event, the consortium will be hosting an online webinar to explore key project outcomes, share experiences of the collectors, sorters, recyclers, brands, and other stakeholders that made this possible and learn more about how each one of us can contribute to closing the textiles loop.
Textiles mountain keeps growing
“The accelerating consumption and disposal practices in fashion cause textiles entering the market to reach their end-of-use rapidly. In North-West Europe alone, around 4,700 kilo tonnes of post-consumer textile waste is generated every year, a small portion of the global mountain of textile waste,” the Fibersort consortium said in an announcement today.
“On average, only 30% of these textiles are collected separately - the rest is lost within household waste. In the best-case scenario, these textiles are sold in the second-hand market both locally and internationally. The remaining textiles are considered non-rewearable textiles due to their unsuitability for the second-hand market or the market saturation that second-hand clothing is currently facing.”
© Fibersort Consortium/ Circle Economy.
“Almost all of these textiles are currently being downcycled, incinerated or landfilled. Nevertheless, 24% of the textiles collected have the potential to be recycled into new textiles, but currently are not. These textiles represent 486 kilo tonnes per year, equivalent to the weight of 50 Eiffel towers,” the consortium stresses.
Automated sorting technologies can enable the industry to turn non-rewearable textiles that currently have no other destination than downcycling, landfill or incineration into valuable feedstock for textile-to-textile recycling.
One of these technologies is the Fibersort, a Near Infrared (NIR) based technology able to categorise textiles in 45 different fractions based on their fibre composition and colour. Over the past few years, Circle Economy says the technology has been optimised, tested and validated to prepare it for commercialisation.
“Fibersorted materials have been validated by project partners and are ready for the market The success of the technology is highly dependent on the end-markets that help transform textile waste into new resources,” the Netherlands based group explains.
The Fibersort project partners Circle Economy, Valvan Baling Systems, ReShare, Procotex, Worn Again Technologies and Smart Fibersorting have worked with industry stakeholders to better understand these end-markets, assess the potential of the sorted materials and validate the business case of automated sorting as a key enabler of textile-to-textile recycling. Results from these activities are available through project publications and Fibersorted materials are now commercially available for other organisations to test their potential for textile-to-textile recycling.
Challenges remain
There are clear opportunities to successfully integrate automated sorting technologies and recycled post-consumer textiles across the value chain, the consortium says. “Over the past years, innovation has spurred across this sector of the industry. However, several challenges remain to ensure the long-term implementation of these technologies in relation to financial and technical feasibility as well as the opportunities to scale. Collectors, sorters, recyclers, manufacturers, brands and policymakers have both opportunities and responsibilities to address these challenges,” it adds.
© Fibersort Consortium/ Circle Economy.
Although the Interreg NWE Fibersort project reaches its ending date in March 2020, the partners in the Fibersort consortium expect to continue working towards this circular ambition, as well as encouraging others to join the journey.
Fibersort Consortium Partners
Textile collection: Leger des Heils ReShare collects around 26 Kt of used clothing in the Netherlands annually. The non-rewearable portion of textiles that are collected generally represents profit loss (or breakeven) for collectors and sorters. However, through the Fibersort project, ReShare has strived to increase the value of collected textiles by creating a market for them in textile to textile recycling markets.
Textile sorting: Smart Fibersorting is a sister company of Wieland Textiles, a sorting company that processes around 9 Kt of used textiles annually. Smart Fibersorting had a crucial role in setting up and optimising operations of the demo plant as an extension of Wieland’s business to ensure optimal technological performance and an improved business case. With the development of the demo plant, Wieland textiles aims to establish a sustainable business model for recyclable textiles. This is a model that allows textiles to maintain, rather than lose, their value by becoming feedstock for textile to textile recycling processes.
Textile recycling: Procotex Corporation processes a wide range of fibres for various applications such as yarn spinning, automotive, mattress, geotextile and other industries. Procotex recycles natural, synthetic and technical textiles as well as preparing flax fibre for the spinning industry. Within the project, they have tested and validated the sorted fractions in their textile to textile recycling processes.
Worn Again Technologies is a technology licensing company that is developing and will commercialise proprietary solvent-based processes that will enable non reusable textiles and polyester packaging resources to remain in constant circulation, driving positive economic, social and environmental benefits. Within the project, Worn Again Technologies has analysed and tested the sorted materials based on their feedstock input specifications to ensure that textiles were separated and prepared in accordance with their recycling process.
Fibersort machine development: Valvan Baling Systems is market leader in the supply of automated sorting as well as baling systems. Within the Fibersort project, Valvan Baling Systems is leading the design, engineering, software development and construction of the Fibersort machine.
Market uptake: Circle Economy is a Dutch-based impact organisation. Its mission is to accelerate the practical and scalable implementation of the circular economy.
“At Circle Economy, we believe in a visionary future for our planet — one in which we do not have to compromise in order to achieve economic, social, and environmental prosperity. As an impact organisation, we connect and empower a global community to create the conditions for systemic transformation. With nature as our mentor, we work alongside businesses, cities and governments to identify opportunities to make the transition to the circular economy and provide a powerful combination of practical and scalable solutions to turn these opportunities into reality. Our mission is to empower a global community of businesses, cities and governments to accelerate the transition to the circular economy through practical and scalable insights and solutions that address humanity’s greatest challenges, Circle Economy concludes.”
The Fibersort project is funded by Interreg NEW. Interreg North-West Europe (NWE) is a European Territorial Cooperation Programme funded by the European Commission with the ambition to make the North-West Europe area a key economic player and an attractive place to work and live, with high levels of innovation, sustainability and cohesion.
Register for the Webinar here
www.circle-economy.com

      Written by Chris Remington	    Published: 12 March 2020        WORMERVEER – A new textile sorting technology has been developed capable of processing 900kg of post-consumer material in just an hour. The Near Infrared (NIR) system, developed by Belgian construction firm Valvan and Dutch firm Wieland Textiles over several years, categorises textiles based on fibre composition and colour.  A consortium of companies support the idea, from textile collectors and recyclers which have tested the real-world application of the solution, to impact organisation Circle Economy which has helped develop the solution. “The long-term target with the project is to create a high-value destination for non-rewearable textiles,” Circle Economy told Ecotextile News. “More action is needed to create a market pull for the use of post-consumer textiles as feedstock for recyclers. Therefore, the project partners call for producers to start incorporating recycled content generated with sorted post-consumer textiles into their products.” Log in or subscribe to see this content   

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Fibersort

<p>The Fibersort is a technology that automatically sorts large volumes of mixed post-consumer textiles based on their fiber composition. These sorted materials are perfectly suited to become inputs for textile recycling processes, and commercialization of the Fibersort will bring closed-loop textiles on step closer to reality.</p>