Australian enviro-tech startup Samsara Eco has announced a significant partnership with popular athletic apparel brand lululemon.
This multi-year collaboration is set to revolutionise textile recycling by scaling circularity and introducing the world’s first infinitely recycled nylon 6,6 and polyester. The joint effort between Samsara Eco and lululemon will focus on transforming apparel waste into high-quality recycled nylon and polyester, offering sustainable alternatives to key materials in the performance apparel industry.
The significance of this collaboration lies in the fact that nylon and polyester account for approximately 60 per cent of clothing manufactured today. These synthetic materials are favoured for their lightweight nature, durability, affordability, and flexibility. However, there is a drawback to these fabrics: when they are washed, they release minuscule plastic fibres known as microfibers, which fall under the category of microplastics – tiny fragments measuring up to five millimetres in size.
Microfibers and other forms of microplastics pose a significant threat as they work their way up the food chain, often mistaken for food by fish and other marine creatures. These microplastics frequently carry harmful contaminants such as toxic pesticides and industrial chemicals. The consequences of ingesting microplastics for marine life are devastating, leading to starvation, disruptions in hormone regulation, stunted growth in certain species, and damage to digestive systems.
The act of doing laundry alone results in the discharge of nearly half a million tonnes of plastic microfibers into the ocean annually, which is equivalent to almost three billion polyester shirts. This occurs because water treatment facilities allow up to 40 per cent of the microfibers they receive to enter lakes, rivers, and, ultimately, the ocean due to their small size. Most treatment plants are not obligated to capture these microfibers.
Alarming statistics reveal that globally, a staggering 87 per cent of discarded textiles end up in landfills, are incinerated, or leak into the environment. Only now, finding a solution for recycling these materials has been elusive.
Samsara Eco’s ground-breaking innovation marks a pivotal milestone in combating plastic pollution and reducing carbon emissions associated with textiles. By breaking down mixed apparel derived from plastic into its core molecules, Samsara Eco enables the creation of brand-new apparel repeatedly.
“The ability to infinitely recycle textiles, including nylon, is an essential solution to tackle the enormous challenge of textile waste in the apparel industry. Together with Lululemon, Samara Eco is creating enzymatically recycled nylon and accelerating textile-to-textile recycling toward truly circular apparel. This is a massive milestone as Samsara Eco achieves an environmentally friendly ability to recycle blended textiles including nylon and polyester,” explains Paul Riley, CEO and Founder of Samsara Eco.
“Nylon remains our biggest opportunity to achieve our 2030 sustainable product goals. This partnership demonstrates what’s possible through collective innovation to solve unmet needs. Through Samsara Eco’s patented enzymatic process, we’re advancing transforming apparel waste into high-quality nylon and polyester, which will help us live into our end-to-end vision of circularity,” says Yogendra Dandapure, Vice President, Raw Materials Innovation at lululemon.
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