CISUTAC will tackle current bottlenecks in the transition to circular textiles and clothing. For scale and significance, we focus on polyester, cotton & cellulosic fibres (together ca. 90% of textile materials) and products from 3 sub-sectors: garments, active goods and workwear. In this way, we will have a representative view on the challenges the textile sector is facing for circular transition. CISUTAC follows a holistic approach covering the technical, sectoral and socio-economic levels. We will provide systemic innovations at these levels and perform 3 pilots to demonstrate their feasibility and value: (i) Repair and disassembly; (ii) Sorting for reuse and recycling; (iii) Circular garments through fibre to fibre recycling and design for circularity. To realise these pilots, we will develop semi-automated workstations, analyse infrastructure and material flow, digitally enhance sorting operations and setup interventions with consumers. After the piloting phase, attention will be on the uptake of the results, by the sector, by the wider stakeholder group as well by the consumers. With (worldwide) leading brands and companies, CSOs, RTOs and EU associations, CISUTAC is truly EU-wide and covers the full novel circular value chain. Through the consortium, and further supported by the Transition Support Group with zz members, CISUTAC is strongly linked to ongoing initiatives allowing synergies and joint activities. This is essential for our implementation but also for leveraging the impact and enabling the shift towards a sustainable EU textiles & clothing, underpinned by circular material flows and supported by the wider stakeholders. CISUTAC will bring significant impact of scale via its innovations on repair, dismantling, sorting and fibre-to-fibre recycling. Realising this impact will lead to a reduction of ca. 975ktonCO2eq yearly and to new business activities and markets that together have a value of ca. €250mio and lead to ca. 1300 FTE, also social economy.

Sustainable innovation in the textile value chain is difficult and time consuming, as the industry is highly fragmented and specialized. The intention is to form an umbrella across the value chain, which allows to jointly define and push the boundaries of the most sustainable cellulosic filament currently available on a “pre-industrial” scale – Lyocell filament. As the starting point is at a TRL5 (pilot) with key drivers and innovators being within the industry (not in basic research), the actual amount of relevant scientific (as in basic research) publications is rare. Lyocell filament has been introduced to the market in small volumes in 2017, but the development of the value chain and the overall market acceptance is still at an early stage. Lyocell filament has the potential to achieve this: continuous-filament yarns (or filament yarns) are smooth to touch, lacking the bulk of staple fiber yarns and can be used to produce a wide range of woven and knitted fabrics for various textiles and clothing. The global filament market exceeds the global staple fiber market, but is still vastly dominated by fossil-based, non-recyclable materials (foremost PET and Polyamide). No significant innovations have been introduced on an industrial scale in decades, however the environmentally friendly, closed-loop lyocell process has been established already in the early 2000s. A European-based global innovator has developed a Lyocell filament (LF) process to a state to improve both commercialization and sustainability with a consortium of key partners along the value chain. The proposed innovation project aims to catalyze further development and validation of key production processes along the value chain; to define business models and plans to enable market uptake within 1–2 years post-project i.e. by 2030.

The GreenSolRes project demonstrates the levulinic acid (LVA) value chain of lignocellulosic feedstocks to high-value products in a 3-step approach on TRL 6. First, a demonstration plant in Biorefinery of RWTH Aachen will be designed and build for conversion of lignocellulosic biomass to the platform chemical levulinic acid. Levulinic acid hydrolysate separation enables more efficient and purer levulinic acid production. In a 2nd step the versatile platform chemical levulinic acid is hydrogenated to 2-methyltetrathydrofuran (2-MTHF), gamma-valerolactone (GVL) and 1-methyl-1,4-butanediol (MeBDO) in a direct process developed by RWTH Aachen. These can be produced in the same reactor with a single catalyst by tuning the process conditions. In parallel, BASF will investigate the conversion of LVA esters to MeBDO and GVL. Third, the application of the products as solvents is validated in adhesives and the pharma sector as substitute of their less sustainable C4-analogues. Additionally, HENKEL studies the development of respective new polymers with improved properties. The basic engineering of first commercial plants for these steps supports rapid upscaling and exploitation after the project. This will release these products from the niche markets they are confined to due to ineffective existing production routes. At competitive prices compared to their petrochemical C4-counterparts these chemicals and related products will boost the bio-based market as they have a high greenhouse gas emission avoidance of at least 70% and an additional value to society via better health & safety properties. The whole value chain from e.g. forestry residues to consumer products is assessed for environmental sustainability, risks and health & safety to support business case development and market implementation.

The goal of CoPro is to develop and to demonstrate methods and tools for process monitoring and optimal dynamic planning, scheduling and control of plants, industrial sites and clusters under dynamic market conditions. CoPro will provide decision support to operators and managers and develop closed-loop solutions to achieve an optimally energy and resource efficient production. In most plants of the process industries, the energy and resource efficiency of the production depends critically on discrete decisions on the use of equipment, shutdowns, product changeovers and cleaning or regeneration of equipment. CoPro will consider these discrete decisions in plant-wide dynamic optimization and develop integrated scheduling and control solutions. Advanced online data analytics will be developed for plant health and product quality monitoring. The detection of anomalies will trigger fast re-scheduling and re-optimization. CoPro will demonstrate advanced plant-wide and site-wide coordination and control in five typical use cases that cover a wide range of sectors of the process industries, and the whole value chain: - Petrochemical production site - Base chemicals and polymer production site - Recycling system in cellulose production - Consumer product formulation and packaging plant - Food processing plant In addition,CoPro will develop methods for the coordination of plants in industrial parks that belong to different companies, thus providing a basis for future industrial symbiosis. CoPro pays special attention to the role of operators and managers in plant-wide control solutions and to the deployment of advanced solutions in industrial sites with a heterogeneous IT environment. As the effort required for the development and maintenance of accurate plant models is the bottleneck for the development and long-term operation of advanced control and scheduling solutions, CoPro will develop methods for efficient modelling and for model quality monitoring and model adaption