The Dutch government has a fixed target for 2025 regarding Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR); in 2025, 50% of the clothing placed on the market must be circular or reusable by weight. To achieve these goals, it is up to companies and producers to commit to a circular economy, which is in 30% reuse and 25% circular materials.
Two of the most commonly used products in clothing are polyester and cotton. While cotton is traditionally seen as a natural and eco-friendly material, questions are increasingly being raised about its true impact on the environment. Polyester, on the other hand, has a less favorable reputation due to its synthetic nature, but offers surprising benefits in terms of circularity.
Polyester vs. Cotton
Cotton is known for its natural origins, but the production process comes with several environmental challenges. Cotton production requires significant amounts of water and pesticides. On average, 10,000 liters of water are needed to produce just one kilogram of cotton, enough to provide an adult male with water for 8.5 years. In addition, one liter of chemicals is also needed per kilogram of cotton, which undermines the claim that cotton is a natural product. Furthermore, cotton is fragile and sheds fibers during use and maintenance, which contributes to the spread of microfibers into the environment and into the body, even in places like the Arctic and in our lungs.
Polyester, on the other hand, although synthetic and originally derived from oil, has unique properties that make it highly suitable for recycling. The biggest advantage of polyester is that it can be easily melted and reformed into long fibers, giving it the potential for endless reuse cycles without loss of quality. This makes polyester, and recycled polyester in particular, a crucial material for a circular clothing industry.
FashionPower: Innovation with recycled polyester
FashionPower, a company that has been producing clothing since 1897, has fully embraced the benefits of polyester as a circular fabric. FashionUnited spoke to Reg Neleman, owner of FashionPower, about their commitment to the UPV.
FashionPower designs and produces mainly sports and corporate clothing, for the brands Redmax, Eecoff and Jack in a Bag. With performance clothing, the properties of the fabric used are crucial; they must be comfortable, odor-reducing, quick-drying and flexible.
Neleman explains how FashionPower works with recycled dopedyed coffee polyester yarn. This unique yarn combines recycled polyester with coffee grounds – a waste product that is normally thrown away. This use of coffee grounds is circular and also offers functional benefits such as odour absorption, breathability, UV protection and moisture regulation that can normally only be achieved with chemicals. In the process, the colour pigments are also added into the yarn and not traditionally around it, which means the colour lasts longer, which saves a lot of water, and reduces CO2 emissions, energy and colour chemicals.
FashionPower’s choice for recycled polyester is not a coincidence. The company has been focused on sustainability and functionality for over a decade. By combining polyester with coffee grounds, FashionPower has developed a material that is not only sustainable, but also functionally superior to many other materials. This yarn, soon to be patented by FashionPower, can be recycled over and over again without loss of quality, making it a strong choice for a circular clothing industry. Where fast fashion often uses a mixture of synthetic materials, the switch to mono-materials is essential for the circular process.
In the context of the UPV but also the European legislation that will follow soon, choices have to be made that require rethinking, according to Neleman; “You simply can no longer do it the way you always did.”
“As the EPR deadlines approach, it is crucial that the industry takes action now and invests in materials that can meet these requirements,” says Neleman. He emphasizes that polyester is, at this moment, the best available option for circularity. Despite the many initiatives around more sustainable alternatives to cotton, these are not yet widely available and often cannot compete with the circularity possibilities of polyester, says Neleman.
A different approach
The path to a circular fashion industry requires a major overhaul of the materials we use, and a completely different approach. Although cotton is traditionally seen as environmentally friendly, from a sustainability and circular perspective it is certainly not as suitable as one might think. Recycled polyester, on the other hand, offers advantages that give it a role in the transition to a circular economy. With its approach, FashionPower shows how polyester, in combination with smart technologies such as the use of coffee grounds, can contribute as an alternative to a more sustainable and circular fashion industry.
