Into a circular world

To tackle the growing mountains of used clothing, it is above all European politicians who are developing a comprehensive strategy for a regulating circular economy. And the textiles industry is also making its mark with innovative technologies for recycling manmade fibers. However, there is still a long way to go before we have a sustainable textile world.

According to the European Environment Agency, the consumption of textiles is already the fourth-largest source of negative environmental and climate change impacts within the European Union (EU). A major reason for this is relentless textile growth: the Ellen MacArthur Foundation states that the global production of textile almost doubled between 2000 and 2015. And the annual consumption of apparel and shoes is expected to further rise by 63 percent by 2030 – from currently 62 million to 102 million tons – adds the European Environment Agency.

This development will further exacerbate the waste problem. Today, around 5.8 million tons of textiles are disposed of in the EU every year. In China, for example, approximately 22 million tons of textile waste were accumulated in 2020, according to information provided by China’s State Council. Of which only around one-fifth is being recycled. In the US, it was – in accordance to the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) – about 17 million tons of textile waste in 2018, of which only 15 percent was collected for recycling. The vast majority always ends up in landfill sites or is incinerated. Across the globe.

The causes of this are population growth and rising affluence, particularly in Asia, the dominant fast fashion business model in the fashion sector and overproduction and overconsumption. This has been identified by the textiles industry, with counter-movements meanwhile emerging across the entire value chain. Increasingly, the objective is to reconcile consumers’ fashion interests with the future needs of a sustainable world worth living in. To this end, the major clothing brands are taking initial steps towards a circular economy and are increasingly including eco collections made from recycled fibers or take-back systems into their programs.

“The companies in our area of business are monitoring the current market activities and trends as well and are increasingly expanding their capabilities with regards to a textile closed-loop. Oerlikon is also developing corresponding technologies and supporting its customers’ efforts to create the circular economy”,

comments Markus Reichwein, Head of Product Management at Oerlikon Barmag. What is driving these activities is not least the extensive legislative amendments that the EU is currently initiating.

EU: predominantly recycled fibers by 2030
With its sustainable and closed loop-compatible textiles strategy, the EU plans to become a pioneer for the global circular economy as well. By 2030, textile products marketed within the EU are to become more durable and recyclable, predominantly comprise recycled fibers, contain no hazardous substances and be manufactured in compliance with social rights and in a manner that protects the environmental. Concrete measures are:

• The introduction of binding eco-design requirements: even during the product design phase, fibers and other components should be chosen and combined in such a way that textiles are more durable and can be repaired, their materials are easier to separate for fiber-to-fiber recycling and they have less of an impact on our climate and the environment.
• The introduction of a Digital Product Passport and amendment of the European Textile Labelling Act.
• Measures for banning the destruction of unsold and returned textiles.
• Tackling pollution caused by microplastics with measures such as product design, manufacturing processes, and washing of synthetic textiles.
• The expanded producer responsibility regulations also for textile waste. According to the EU waste legislation, different textile waste must be collected separately from January 1, 2025 at the latest.
• Restrictions on textile waste exports in non-OECD countries and the development of criteria for distinguishing between waste and used textile goods.
• Empowering consumers and tackling greenwashing by means of new requirements for reliable environment-related product information.

Circular revolution
Europe is showing considerable initiative. But where else is progress being made with regards to the circular concept? China, which produces half of all global textile fibers, is planning to expand its textile recycling capacities. According to the State Council, the country is planning to recycle a quarter of its non-biodegradable textile waste and turn it into 2 million tons of recycled fibers annually by 2025. Five years later, it is planned that there will be a relatively complete system for recycling 30 percent of textile waste and 3 million tons of recycled fibers annually.

In the US, the federal structure and the relative autonomy of the individual states are proving to be stumbling blocks. A report issued by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the U.S. Department of Commerce dated May 2022 and entitled ‘Facilitating a Circular Economy for Textiles’ refers to the fact that the state and local governments are responsible for topics such as dealing with solid waste. It also notes that just one US state is aiming to ban the disposal of textiles, while others are focusing on programs targeted at collecting old carpeting.

And developing manufacturing nations will have to face challenges on their journey into the textile circular economy. Bangladesh, for example, is increasingly manufacturing recycled products. The ‘Circular Innovation and Ecodesign in the Textiles Sector’ study published by the Finnish innovation fund Sitra back in 2022 discloses that also in Sri Lanka and Vietnam, that textile companies hope to become more sustainable and lower the carbon footprint of their products and production.

On the way to fiber-to-fiber recycling
In addition to regulatory initiatives, technical innovation is required to connect the beginning and the end of the linear textiles industry and to close the loop. One decisive circular technology here is fiber-to-fiber recycling. Only a few years ago, this process was used to recycle around just 1 percent of used clothing worldwide into fibers for new apparel. McKinsey market researchers are now talking about 18 to 26 percent being recycled by 2030 – if the full technical recycling potential is utilized and more textiles are collected. For this, manual processes will have to be automated, clothing waste qualitatively sorted, buttons and zips removed and fiber compositions unambiguously identified – and all less expensively. Separating mixed fibers still represents an obstacle as well. Finally, the recycled materials must be suitable for the spinning process, provide a usable yarn quality and be able to be further processed, i.e. dyed. Despite these challenges, there are promising solutions on the horizon, even though some processes are not yet ready for commercial exploitation.

Thermomechanical processes are suitable for recycling PET fibers, for example – in a nutshell: the remelting and further processing of mono-materials. BB Engineering – a joint venture between Oerlikon Barmag and the Brückner Group – has, for example, developed an environmentally-friendly, economical and energy-efficient solution for the fiber-to-fiber recycling of various types of fibrous PET waste – the VacuFil Visco+. With this spinning system, the recycled materials are already being further processed into high-end POY/FDY filament yarn. The potential of such technologies is huge: PET fibers make up 52 percent of global fiber production. Using rPET instead of virgin PET will also reduce the carbon footprint by more than 70 percent.

The large Indonesian textile manufacturer PT. Kahatex uses the homogenization technology from Oerlikon Barmag Huitong Engineering (OBHE), a joint venture von Oerlikon Barmag and Yangzhou Huitong Chemical Engineering Technique Co., Ltd, to mechanically recycle prepared PET waste such as popcorn, bottle flakes and films. The chips manufactured from this are returned to textile production.

Beacon of hope: chemical recycling
With chemical recycling, polyester fibers, for example, have the polymer components extracted using chemicals and processed into new fibers. These complex, frequently industrially still underdeveloped processes are creating initial solutions for recycling mixed fabrics. These kinds of processes for chemically recycling polyester in used clothing and waste is also being utilized and researched by the Chinese company Zhejiang Jiaren New Material Co., Ltd., for example. Its ‘Green Circle’ unites well-known textile companies. And another promising newcomer is the German start-up RITTEC, which utilizes an energy-saving process to manufacture polyester-blend clothing from mixed textiles and is already using a Digital Product Passport.

The British partnership Worn Againis focusing on a solvent-based recycling technology, with which both end-of-life textiles comprising polyester and polycotton blends and PET plastics can be converted into circular raw materials and fibers (polyester and cellulose). Here, Worn Again is collaborating with partners along the entire value chain, including Texaid. The German-Swiss recycling specialist is working on a sorting system for scalable fiber-to-fiber recycling. The project is part of the ReHubs initiative of the European Apparel and Textile Confederation EURATEX, which plans to enable the fiber-to-fiber recycling of 2.5 million tons of textile waste by 2030.

“Recycling only works when all players cooperate in a circular system”,

emphasizes Georg Stausberg. The Oerlikon Polymer Processing Solutions Division’s CEO is looking to the future:

“The time for closed-loop strategies and the corresponding technologies is now.”