Circle Economy has officially launched the Fibersort Project which uses innovative technology to automatically sort large volumes of mixed post-consumer textiles based on fibre composition. Along with project partners Valvan Baling Systems, Reshare, Procotex, Worn Again and Smart Fibersorting, the organisation will soon undertake testing on the sorted materials and the results will be disclosed in future Fibersort reports. A ‘Demo Day’ has been scheduled for March 14th to showcase Fibersort’s technology at work and to share performance information with the industry for the first time. The event will also have project partners host workshops to gain an in-depth understanding of systemic issues around recycled textiles.
The project partners give out figures which show of all textiles discarded in Northwest Europe, only 30 per cent are collected and almost half of the collected items are only fit to be downcycled, landfilled or incinerated. The Fibersort Project hopes to give them a chance to become inputs for textile-to-textile recycling.
The Fibersort technology, funded by Interreg NWE, is now in operation and the first Fibersorted materials are now commercially available. The project aims to reduce the need for virgin textile materials by providing feedstock more efficiently for textile-to-textile recycling and creating additional market value by making it economically feasible to sort textile waste. Cyndi Rhoades, CEO, Worn Again explains, Fibersort will enable suppliers of post-consumer textiles to meet the feedstock specification for our process more efficiently than today’s sorting methods. The results of the Fibersort are looking promising.
