Recycling of Low Grade Clothing Waste - Oakdene Hollins

© Oakdene Hollins Ltd, Salvation Army Trading Company Ltd
Nonwovens Innovation & Research Institute Ltd September 2006
Material flows in the UK secondary textiles market are shown in
Appendix I.
Prior to this study, no accurate figures were available for the either the
quantity of textiles being discarded by UK consumers or the tonnage of
waste textiles entering the waste stream in any year. It was estimated that
all textiles entering the waste stream make up around 2‐4% of the municipal
solid waste (MSW). This is the major portion of the total discarded. The
degree to which consumers stockpiled used clothes was not known but was
perceived to be significant and represented a third factor in the mass
balance equation for textiles as a whole.
3.3 Market Trends
It is perceived that the economics of textile re‐use and recycling are
deteriorating because:
• The rapidly declining price of new clothing entering the market,
through imports from low labour‐cost countries in the Far East, is
lowering the price being realised for the re‐sale of wearable clothing in
the UK and in export markets
• The re‐use proportion of textiles collected is declining because of the
increased mix of low quality items
• The recycling proportion is increasing, but selling for flocking or
shoddy generates only about 10% of collection costs i.e. there is a lack
of value‐added markets for recycling grades of textiles
• Regulatory and employment costs in the UK are increasing
• Disposal costs of residues not suitable for recycling are increasing.
Collection economics are driven by the value in textiles re‐used as clothing,
which subsidises the increasing losses on recycling and disposal. The
adverse trends in the market are highly likely to result in an increase in the
amount of textile waste being discarded to the waste stream and a
reduction in the extent of textile recycling. This will occur at a time when
certain alternative technologies for biological municipal waste (BMW)
treatment, such as autoclaving and anaerobic digestion, are under
demonstration. These technologies will have little impact on textiles, which
are retained in the process residues and adversely affect the economics of
the technologies. Under current policy conditions, which are generally
based on weights diverted from landfill, Local Authorities are incentivised
to remove denser items from the waste stream (e.g. cardboard and glass)
and the lighter textile stream is likely to remain untouched. The textiles
area also falls outside the priority areas of the Waste and Resources Action
Programme (WRAP) and they have no interest in supporting it.
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