Walking on circular flooring solutions

The flooring industry faces several challenges in its transition towards circularity: complex value chain, lack of knowledge exchange along the entire value chain, different national legislation and habits, numerous product types with various raw materials and additives, lifetime varying from a couple of days in the case of event carpets to up to 20 years for comercial flooring.

The European Floor Coverings Association (EuFCA) and other participants in the industry – from research institutes, recycling companies and public authorities – have teamed up to create a framework for circular floor coverings to minimise the sector’s environmental impact. Under the EU-funded CISUFLO project, circular solutions will be found. The project includes six pilots focusing on manufacturing, sorting, separating, and recycling laminates, resilient floor coverings and carpets.

CISUFLO aims to set up a systemic framework for circular and sustainable floor coverings (carpets, resilient floor coverings and laminates) and minimise the sector’s total environmental impact. Several challenges exist within flooring to make the transition to a circular economy: (i) complex value chain, varying from country to country; (ii) link to various sectors (construction & building, plastics, textiles & wood); (iii) products cover various raw materials, plus numerous additives; (iv) product lifetimes range from over 20 years (commercial flooring) to 3-4 days (event carpet).

CISUFLO provides systemic innovations at the technical, information and socio-economic level and performs 6 pilots to demonstrate their feasibility and value (future flooring, sorting, separation, laminate, vinyl and textile flooring recycling). The basis for circularity is realising circular material streams. Therefore, we focus on the main flooring material streams: wood (laminates), PA (carpets) and PVC (resilient).

We aim to realise circularisation via innovations that deliver value along the chain: (i) manufacturing flooring that is easier to remove, re-use, repair & recycle, as a competitive advantage to the manufacturer, and beneficial to several players along the value chain; (ii) integrated product information system enables sorting, but also offers extra functionalities for installation, cleaning and maintenance, and sustainability info for customer at purchasing phase.

To engage a broader range of stakeholders and ensure uptake beyond the project we have established a Transition Support Group (TSG) with over 30 members covering technology providers, retailers and collectors.

Assuming our impact reaches 30% of the market, CISUFLO will help to shift a turnover of ca. 5 billion to the circular economy, which will significantly help to secure ca 12.000 jobs in the sector and create additionally ca 2500 jobs in collection and recycling.

Partners

• CENTRE SCIENTIFIQUE & TECHNIQUE DEL'INDUSTRIE TEXTILE BELGE ASBL
• TFI - INSTITUT FUR BODENSYSTEME ANDER RWTH AACHEN EV
• TEKNOLOGIAN TUTKIMUSKESKUS VTT OY
• INSTITUT TECHNOLOGIQUE FCBA (FORETCELLULOSE BOIS-CONSTRUCTION AMEUBLEMENT)
• RHEINISCH-WESTFAELISCHE TECHNISCHE HOCHSCHULE AACHEN
• NEDERLANDSE ORGANISATIE VOOR TOEGEPAST NATUURWETENSCHAPPELIJK ONDERZOEK TNO
• UNILIN
• UNILIN SAS
• FLOORING INDUSTRIES LIMITED
• BEAULIEU INTERNATIONAL GROUP NV
• B.I.G. FLOORCVERINGS
• EDEL CARPETS BV
• AQUAFIL SPA
• DECEUNINCK
• RINA CONSULTING SPA
• RINA CONSULTING - CENTRO SVILUPPO MATERIALI SPA
• CWS HYGIENE INTERNATIONAL GMBH
• CWS INTERNATIONAL GMBH
• MOGU SRL
• ENCO SRL
• CONTRACT FLOORING ASSOCIATION LIMITED
• FEDERATION EUROPEENNE DE PANNEAUX A BASE DE BOIS
• EUROPEAN PLASTICS CONVERTERS
• POLYMER COMPLY EUROPE
• EUROPEAN FLOOR COVERINGS ASSOCIATIO

Start date: 1 June 2021 - End date: 31 May 2025

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 101003893.