The usage of disposable items in the health care sector is increasing. Similar development can be seen in industry sectors like food, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals. There are a number of drivers behind this development, they are, drastic decrease in cost of production and distribution, increased simplicity and ease of use and finally an increased level of controlled sterility/cleanness compared with alternative solutions. The down side with this development is that disposable items are wasted and incinerated rather than recycled and being an integral part of a circular system. By disposing and incinerating valuable resources, normally fossil based, this development is accelerating negative environmental effects.
At the same time technology is available for introducing plant based textile fibers as alternative for many of the fossil based textile fibers. Also new recycling technologies, both chemical as well as mechanical, are being scaled up, opening up for better usage of already existing textile resources, including fossil based textile resources. One important strategy for the future is to keep resources in circular loops. This project wants to keep the unique properties (cost, ease-of-use, cleanness) that disposable items brings to the health care sector but changing the resource base from fossil virgin to recycled and biobased. By targeting the health care sector as a “fostering platform” for new solutions, the project outcome will be equally applicable for related industry sectors like food, cosmetics and pharmaceutical.
Sweden and Finland, both prominent actors in the future circular bio based economy, have excellent positions to jointly develop, set up and manage a future circular system. The project will combine complementing world class technology from both countries.
Participants
Pure Waste Textile (PWT), VTT, Cellcomb, Fibrer-x, Stockholms Läns Landsting (SSL), Sporda Nonwoven, RISE IVF and Wargön Innovation.
Budget & time plan
The Finnish budget of the project is 497 914 EUR, and the Swedish budget is 2 300 000 SEK. The project runs during 24 months.