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want those decisions to be as commercial as possible.” Demonstrating a pragmatic approach to both innovating with more recycled product and facilitating full reuse, she added: “There will always be a place for new product, and our main priority is making sure that the new product is as good as it can be, using as little virgin petrochemicals as possible, and designed in a way that there are options at end of life.”
Reuse
“Our main priority is making sure that the new product we’re selling is as good as it can be, using as little virgin petrochemicals as possible” Becky Gordon, Interface
In addition to greatly increasing the percentage of recycled material in ‘new’ products however, Interface is also working with a range of partners such as Uplyfted to facilitate reuse of used bitumen-backed tiles in sectors such as social housing, with the bold aim that “no tiles go to landfill.” With reuse being critical to developing the circular economy, Interface is going a long way to deliver simple reuse methods, and helping specifiers engage clients and customers in the ‘circular argument.’ This new business model enables social housing and charity providers to improve flats for tenants across the UK, on both aesthetics and comfort. Gordon admitted that the firm is “not yet seeing the demand for reused product on new projects,” but added that clients are looking to retain existing carpet in some refurbishments, and Interface is working with them to combine this with new installations. The firm’s ‘route 1’ approach, following the end of life of an initial tile specification, is to “explore reuse with local businesses, charities and others who need support,” ‘route 2’ is to recycle the tiles to other industries (in the case of bitumen-backed) or into new carpet tiles. The “last resort,” says Interface, is to incinerate, but even then it will be “converted into energy.”
A shift in thinking True circular approaches require a complete shift in thinking on the part of manufacturers with complex supply chains, however Interface has been working hard at this since the 1990s. Gordon explained how they are looking at introducing waste bio-materials from agriculture to help serve the supply pipeline which Interface needs as it ramps up bio-based content in its ranges. However, as architect Lucy Bagshaw of tp bennett explained at Interface’s Clerkenwell event, supply chains’ complexity is one major reason for the challenges to unravel on increasing recycled content
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and recycling. She pinpointed a different circularity that was needed in the industry itself – that it was “up to us as designers, the more of us that ask about it, the more it will influence manufacturers.” Gordon asserted that “it’s not the case that a product with higher recycled content is going to cost more. When we made the change from a bitumen backing to a biocomposite, we didn’t pass that cost on to the customer.” She adds that economies of scale made this a viable proposition for the business, as demand for bio-based increases. Bagshaw praised Interface’s approach to examining its existing ranges to drive sustainability, describing it as: “We’ve found a solution, we’re going to look at our existing portfolio and re-engineer it to work with this new information.” She contrasted this with the approach of bringing out ‘more sustainable’ options of products rather than improving existing lines. At the Clerkenwell event, Interface presented ideas for architects looking to increase products’ recycled content, saying that the key was “ensuring you have as much data as possible is crucial to judge whether a product supports your sustainability ambitions for a project.” They added that EPDs can provide info on carbon footprint, but even once the data is obtained, they advised “asking the manufacturers questions to determine a product’s content and what its end-of-life options are.”
Not all manufacturers will have the bandwidth to combine true circularity with provision of the range of offers that designers will demand for clients (Bagshaw said: “designers have a duty to understand that EPDs are really expensive.”) However the general momentum is pushing the whole industry in the right direction. The question may soon be not ‘can you provide closed loop recycling,’ but ‘why aren’t you?’ As Bagshaw confirmed, collaboration is required to work change through supply chains; between specifiers and manufacturers, and in the form of partnerships between manufacturers and innovative start ups. It also helps avoid greenwashing, she said, but “it has to be a conversation, nobody’s perfect at the moment, but the best projects have been the ones where there is synergy and open conversations within the project team.” Becky Gordon concluded with a key message: “Transparency can be complicated, but it’s the right thing to do.”
ADF SEPTEMBER 2024
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