EACH year in the USA alone, 13 million tonnes of textile waste is created, with about 11 million of that ending up in landfills. Although garment recycling has been around for ages, it isn’t a viable solution for creating new clothes. That will soon change with some new technology by a start-up called Evrnu which breaks down garment waste and turns it into new fabric.
Evrnu CEO Stacy Flynn had been in the textile industry for about a dozen years when in 2010, a month-long overseas assignment to China allowed her to see up close how environmentally damaging the textile industry actually is. For example, she discovered that making a simple cotton shirt required 700 gallons (2,650 litres) of fresh clean water.
“The air quality was so poor, the water quality was so poor, and I began adding up the millions of yards of fabric I had personally created to that point,” she said. “I decided I wanted to spend the rest of my career finding solutions powerful enough to correct this problem.”
That trip impacted her so much that she decided to return to school to do an MBA in sustainable systems where she researched ways to combat garment industry waste. Flynn figured if there was a way to break down old garments and turn them into new fibre, it would significantly reduce the environmental impact of the industry.
But when she ran the idea by others in 2014, everybody thought it was a crazy idea except Christopher Stanev, a former colleague, who believed in the idea. They experimented by taking a T-shirt, turning it into liquid form and back to solid, using a simple syringe. That was the proof of concept they needed and they formed Evrnu together.
Evrnu’s technology breaks down consumer textile waste to the molecular level and then transforms it into high-quality cellulosic fibre called NuCycl, for the creation of new textiles. This process uses 98 per cent less water than virgin cotton and generates 90 per cent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than virgin polyester.
Their big breakthrough came in 2016 when Levi Strauss & Co teamed up with Evrnu to generate a sustainable prototype of Levi’s 511 Jeans. The collaboration resulted in the creation of eco-friendly jeans made from discarded cotton T-shirts.
“This first prototype represents a major advancement in apparel innovation,” said Paul Dillinger, head of global product innovation at Levi Strauss & Co. We have the potential to reduce by 98 per cent the water that would otherwise be needed to grow virgin cotton while giving multiple lives to each garment.”
LEADING WITH INNOVATION
Of course, in order for this technology to be adopted, the resulting fibre must actually be at least as good, if not better than what virgin materials can do naturally. Levi’s for example, gave Evrnu their 511 jeans and asked them to duplicate it exactly. They expected it to look like cotton, feel like cotton and perform like cotton.
“We were able to do that, along with some additional performance attributes,” says Flynn. “That’s our goal. The consumer will gravitate toward a product that looks good, feels good and performs well. The fact that we’re cutting water by 98 per cent compared to cotton or cutting C02 by 90 per cent compared to polyester is in the background. That’s not how we lead. We lead with innovation.”
Evrnu is a technology company, not a garment manufacturer. As such, although it owns the technology to break down the garment waste, it doesn’t actually manufacture the product. Instead, brands pay the company engineering fees to development garment programs which can then be used by a manufacturer to create the products.
Besides Levi’s, Target (a big US department store chain), Stella McCartney and an unnamed large athletic-wear company are also collaborating with Evrnu. “The last four years has been about building the technology,” Flynn says, adding: “We are now working with four brands and don’t intend to bring any others on board until they go to retail.”
The company’s target is to have all four brands retailing recycled lines by the end of this year. “In the end, our goal is to significantly reduce the negative impact on air, soil, water, and trees,” she says, before concluding: “The sooner our fibre is at mass production, the sooner we start to take some of the pressure off those resources.”
NUCYCL FIBRE ENGINEERING PROCESS
Gather
Discarded textiles are diverted from landfills and collected to be sorted and separated.
Purify
The garments are disassembled, then shredded and broken down to the molecular level.
Fibre
The raw materials are then engineered into a new fibre profile with unique performance advantages.
Yarn
The pristine, new engineered fibre is spun into yarn.
Fabric
New premium-quality, high-performance fabrics are made by mill partners for designers and brands.
Oon Yeoh is a consultant with experiences in print, online and mobile media. Reach him atoonyeoh@gmail.com.