In 2020, the EU generated an estimated 6.95 million tonnes of textile waste, hence around 16 kg per person. Only 4.4 kg per person were separately collected for reuse and recycling, while the majority, 11.6 kg, ended up in mixed household waste. This growing environmental burden is now prompting decisive policy action.
From January 2025, as part of the EU Waste Framework Directive, across European member states the separate collection of textile waste has become mandatory. This is expected to significantly increase collection volumes, particularly of lower-quality garments often resulting from fast fashion trends, items no longer suitable for reuse and challenging to recycle through conventional methods.
This is where industrial symbiosis, as championed by the SYMBA project, can play a transformative role.
By promoting cross-sectoral collaboration, SYMBA stimulates the recycling of textile waste to high-quality secondary raw materials, avoiding landfill disposal or incineration. For example:
- PA6 textile waste could be fed into a chemical or thermo-mechanical recycling process, ending up with regained material for the plastics sector.
- Cellulosic textile waste could be used in biorefinery processes ending up with value-added chemicals like bioethanol, lactic acid, sorbitol etc.
Additionally, on 19 February 2025, The European Parliament and the Council of the European Union agreed to a draft Waste Framework Directive which supports the sustainability of the textile industry by adding an Extended Producer Responsibility to textiles. Producers will become responsible to pay for the collection, sorting, and recycling of textile waste regardless of where they are based or how they sell goods. They must cover the costs for collecting sorting and recycling textile waste. The EPR obligation will come into force 30 months after the introduction of the directive and applies to all producers. Also, micro-enterprises must comply with the EPR requirements but are given an additional transition period of 12 months.
This regulation is also an important opportunity for industrial symbiosis concepts, such as those advocated by SYMBA. If end-of-use textile products are reused in other industries, manufacturers might gain from eco-modulated charges, hence pay less if their products are more recyclable or sustainable.
With SYMBA’s ongoing pursuit of synergies in industries such as agri-food, packaging, wastewater, textile and waste valorization, such regulatory evolutions become pivotal. They emphasize just how acutely there is a need for integrated, circular solutions that are available from industrial symbiosis: transforming waste into value, and regulation into opportunity.