Category: General
Country: United Kingdom
Region: US, EU and UK
Growing concerns for managing textile waste properly is a focused area for countries like US, EU and UK as they are witnessing various interesting developments in this direction and coming months will be crucial for them in this regard.
By Dheeraj Tagra
15-September-2023 | 11 mins read
Average American throws away 70 pounds of clothing and other textiles every year. With only an estimated 15 per cent being reused or downcycled, less than 1 per cent of that is actually recycled and 85 per cent finds its way to landfills where much of it does not degrade. UK, having a strong collection system as 620,000 tonnes of its used textiles are collected separately for reuse and recycling each year, further needs to increase domestic sorting and reprocessing of textiles not suitable for reuse to capitalise on the growing demand for recycled content and extract maximum value from material flows. The UK spends more on apparel than any other country in the EU. Growing concerns for managing textile waste properly is a focused area for countries like US, EU and UK as they are witnessing various interesting developments in this direction and coming months will be crucial for them in this regard.
Responsible Textile Recovery Act and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) law at the core
Collaborative efforts are key to any major initiative, and in US, sustainable activities are strongly taking place at ground level especially as the proposed rules seem stringent for brands and retailers. Responsible Textile Recovery Act (SB-707) and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) law are at the core. EPR means that producers are responsible for an appropriate collection system, recycling and reusing of clothing and household textiles and the financing of this entire system.
Senators Josh Newman, Nancy Skinner and Scott Wiener recently introduced Senate Bill 707 (SB-707) or the Responsible Textile Recovery Act. It aims to hold apparel producers accountable for the collection and recycling of their products. This is the first-of-its-kind to make brands responsible for their products after they are sold and used. If SB-707 becomes a law, it will have far-reaching implications for the fashion industry, not only in California but also beyond state borders.
The penalty for non-compliance with the programme’s requirements would be a daily fine set at US $ 10,000 and US $ 50,000 for intentional or reckless violations. SB-707 would also establish the Textile Stewardship Recovery Fund, which would receive fees paid by programme operators.
Organisations related to brands, retailers are worried that the current draft of the proposal will create more problems than it will solve. The American Apparel and Footwear Association (AAFA), Accelerating Circularity Inc., and American Circular Textiles also wrote to Assembly member Luz M Rivas, saying they had a ‘vested interest’ in the success of SB-707 and that it is critical for the Bill to accomplish what it has set out to achieve as the first-ever national EPR scheme. These organisations are calling on the US Senate to make SB-707 a two-year bill, noting it is positioned to influence all future textile EPR legislations in the US and saying the additional time would also afford all stakeholders the ability to learn from both California’s own pilot textiles EPR programme passed last year, as well as the ongoing efforts in the EU to stand up for a textile EPR programme.
The penalty for noncompliance with the programme’s requirements would be a daily fine set at US $ 10,000 and US $ 50,000 for intentional or reckless violations. SB707 would also establish the Textile Stewardship Recovery Fund, which would receive fees paid by programme operators
The same organisations are also apprehensive about the scope and mechanics of SB 707 as there are concerns about the bill truly supporting circularity efforts like reusing and recycling through the implementation of the correct infrastructure and enhancing support to markets from both consumer and business perspective. Clarity is required on guidelines with regard to product safety, sorting and material handling and even for brand and retailer responsibility and liability, data should be leveraged to create a needs assessment based on completed pilots to inform success at scale etc.
Though there are more forthcoming amendments coming up, organisations are strongly of the view that at this point, there is not enough time left in the legislative calendar to meaningfully address all the concerns raised. Additional time will afford all stakeholders the ability to work through difficult issues and sincerely collaborate on crafting an effective programme.
It is a significant point as the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act (SB 54) took four years to negotiate and the infrastructure for plastic waste collection, sorting and recycling is considerably more developed than similar infrastructure for textiles. Similar opportunities are being sought for by the textile and fashion industry as stakeholders are set to have robust and frank discussions about this proposal.
Similarly, a coalition – the American Circular Textiles Group (ACT) – an initiative to align fashion’s circularity stakeholders with supportive policy and scalable change, has urged the Government to take decisive action on waste by amending existing EPR laws to include textiles, or through the enactment of separate textile-specific EPR laws aligned with the waste hierarchy. Waste hierarchy is a tool used in the evaluation of processes that protect the environment alongside resource and energy consumption from most favourable to least favourable actions.
Organisations working for sustainability in fashion
Fashion for Good
Fair Wear Foundation
Clean Clothes Campaign
Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC)
Global Fashion Exchange
Global Fashion Agenda (GFA)
Fashion Revolution
Textile Exchange
American Circular Textiles Group (ACT)
Ellen MacArthur Foundation
Accelerating Circularity Inc
Good On You
Sustainable Fashion Forum
Centre for Sustainable Fashion
Politically In Fashion
RE/MAKE OUR WORLD
Policy Hub
Extinction Rebellion (XR)
United Nations Alliance for Sustainable Fashion
Redress
The ACT includes H&M, Rent the Runway (rental e-commerce platform), The RealReal (fashion marketplace) Reformation (sustainable fashion brand) and thredUp (online fashion thrift store). ACT also suggests deposit schemes that encourage textile collection and fund circular systems. Using deposit systems similar to those used for other products can motivate consumers to adopt both sustainable behaviour and promote the ‘logistics, sortation and infrastructure for domestic reuse and recycling’.
It is worth mentioning here that the European Commission’s new proposed rules reinforce the commitment outlined in the EU Strategy for Sustainable and Circular Textiles to harmonise EPR rules for textiles and foster economic incentives for more sustainable and circular textile products. At the centre of this proposal is the introduction of mandatory and harmonised EPR schemes for textiles in all EU Member States.
The financial contributions made by producers to the EPR scheme will be determined based on the environmental performance of their textiles, following the principle of ‘eco-modulation’ (concept of penalising the use of materials that are perceived to be environmentally harmful, while rewarding the use of those which are perceived as being better for the environment).
These developments are significant as the EU’s goal is to push fashion companies to produce circular textiles that are durable, can be easily reused and recycled by 2030. Just a few months back, European Commission spearheaded a ban on the destruction of unsold consumer products such as textiles and footwear.
UK’s ‘Maximising Resources, Minimising Waste’ programme
On the other hand, earlier UK had no plans for EPR for textiles but the Government has recently announced a new programme to curb textile waste called ‘Maximising Resources, Minimising Waste’. For textiles, it includes proposals to develop a model for an EPR scheme, as well as measures to increase product life, divert materials from waste and stimulate the textile recycling industry.
WRAP, Climate action NGO, UK-based Eunomia Research & Consulting have also come up with various reports making several recommendations specifically related to EPR.
These include establishing a uniform definition of the ‘obligated producer’ in such systems, specifying which textiles initially and potentially in the future can be covered by an EPR system, recommending upfront the principles for reporting systems to calculate and allocate fees and guaranteeing data security to build trust within the EPR system.
‘Maximising Resources, Minimising Waste’ will bring together a range of measures backed by government funding as the UK aims to support its waste reduction targets and Net Zero commitment, through reducing textiles going to residual waste. This means increasing product utilisation, diverting products and materials from residual waste and stimulating a profitable textile recycling industry. It will look to drive standardised measurement and report waste generation across the supply chain, with an initial focus on unsold and surplus stock.
UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), the UK Government’s research funder, has invested £ 6 million to support three complementary networks of researchers. They will work in partnership with industry experts and other stakeholders to build a bank of data and knowledge and support the innovative sector in adopting sustainable circular business models.
These three networks are:
The Back to Baselines in Circular Fashion and Textiles Network, being led by the University of Leeds. It will establish a baseline to analyse the current status of sustainability practices in the industry.
Future Fibres Network, led by the University of Exeter, aims to embed environmental sciences at the heart of fashion, wider apparel and textile sectors and establish systematic, circular and sustainable principles as the industry norm.
The IMPACT+ Network, led by Northumbria University, will assemble a cross-disciplinary team to improve the collation, analysis and assessment of data to advance the reliability and authenticity of environmental impact measures.
Courtesy: Apparelresources.com
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