Towards Sustainable Textile System with Telavalue

This is a final report of Telavalue project funded by Business Finland. Telavalue was 2.5-year Co-Innovation project in which public research was carried out by VTT, Turku University of Applied Sciences and LAB University of Applied Sciences in collaboration with 17 partner organizations. Telavalue project was a third phase of the public research carried out within Telaketju research ecosystem. The vision of Telavalue consortium was to find solutions to sustainability and waste problems related to current textile system through circular economy, and thus support and build value chains for sustainable production, use and cycles of textiles in Finland.
In Telavalue research we built knowledge on value chains for sustainable and circular textile business, for example, by studying impacts of moving from linear towards circular value chains, and defining value propositions based on circularity. We created expertise in application of novel bio-based and recycled fibres in high quality, sustainable and long-life textile end-products. We studied circular economy business models and built knowledge for implementation of new circular business models. We looked on how material circularity can be achieved by ensuring high quality and value in textile material recovery. We carried out studies, and made process development and demonstrations aiming for fibre-to-fibre recycling and use of textile in valuable non-textile applications.
This report summarises shortly our findings and results related circular textile ecosystem, circular business models, as well as recycling and use of secondary raw materials, and gives overview of impact of the project in partner organizations. Significant business and export potential is expected for Finnish textile sector by renewal of industry, for example, via bio-, circular, and digital transformation. We aimed to improve business and export opportunities of Telavalue consortium and Finnish textile industry by active networking, collaboration, and dissemination of results. Links to more detailed publications of results are given within this report, and summary of our main dissemination activities have been listed in Annex.