After two years of study, the EU-backed tExtended project, which aims to solve the growing issue of textile waste, has started its second phase. The four-year, US $ 15.6 million project is creating a strategy plan to demonstrate practical approaches to recycling, value recovery, repurposing, and textile recovery.
tExtended is making strides in improving its Conceptual Framework, a knowledge-based plan intended to uphold standards of excellence. Phase II entails testing the framework in an actual industrial-urban symbiosis environment to confirm that it can reduce textile waste by an impressive 80 per cent.
Throughout Europe and beyond, there is growing pressure to solve the growing issue of textile waste. When it comes to waste management, the European Commission has made textiles and plastics a top priority.
The Plastics Technology Centre, also known as AIMPLAS, plays a crucial role in a number of areas throughout this second phase.
Through a collaboration with VTT, AIMPLAS is utilising cutting-edge technology such as optical sensors (including NIR, RGB, and hyperspectral cameras) with a focus on material identification and classification. Finding textile compositions that meet recycling requirements is the goal.
Additionally, the partners are developing air separation processes to classify clothing by kind and are pioneering separation approaches for non-textile materials utilising triboelectric and electrostatic technologies.
Pilot-scale modified equipment made for processing textile components makes these developments possible. In order to improve the recyclability of the remaining materials, the centre is also investigating the dissolving of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) from textile waste.
In order to recover polyols, which may subsequently be reincorporated into new polyurethane foam formulations, AIMPLAS is also developing a chemical recycling method for polyurethane foams.
Activities for the tExtended project are being carried out in Finland, Sweden, Belgium, France, Ireland, Latvia, Slovakia, Spain, Portugal, and Switzerland, as well as in a pan-European real-scale demonstrator that is currently under development. Additionally, regional studies are being conducted locally to evaluate the possibility of replication.
Another area of emphasis for tExtended, which is funded by the European Commission’s Horizon Europe research and innovation initiative, is societal engagement in the textile industry.
