Recycled Fashion

Globally, the textiles industry is worth over $1 trillion, ranked the second biggest global economic activity for intensity of trade, and employs approximately 26 million people. Moreover, it contributes to 7% of world exports, supporting a number of developing, small and industrialised economies as well as individual incomes around the world. The fastest growing sector in household waste is Textiles. Over the last ten years, discounting and low retail prices in the UK have led to 60% increase in sales of clothing, with a resultant 90% rise in textile waste from the consumer. Between 2-3% of UK municipal solid waste contains textiles and shoes. In the UK, it is estimated that consumption of textiles is now 24.16m tonnes, on average 35kg per capita, producing around 3.1 million tonnes of CO2, 2 million tonnes of waste and 70 million tonnes of waste water per year - with 1.5 million tonnes of unwanted clothing ultimately ending up in landfill with the associated methane and greenhouse gas emissions (DEFRA 2006, Madsen et al 2007, University of Cambridge, 2006). The UK government, through DEFRA, took action to “identify, understand and address sustainability impacts from products, services and materials consumed and used in the UK” (DEFRA 2008b). They have set out to examine ten product areas with high negative impact on the environment; textiles/clothing is one. We present findings from research conducted for the Centre for Remanufacturing and Reuse on end of life (EoL) management of corporate wear as part of a project funding for the Clothing Roadmap scheme, to be presented to the Government. Site visits and interviews were conducted with a textile recycler in London and a corporation providing corporate wear to examine and understand their End of Life management approaches. Some of the issues raised were: the daily shipment of some 22500 kg of clothing overseas, the seasonal nature of the clothing disposal, the detailed market knowledge required for effective reuse, the necessity for customer relationships and the need for clear government policies to support and regulate the legitimate collection and use of waste. This research aims to explore remanufacturing opportunities for the industry at the end of the lifecycle of clothing. From literature review conducted, reuse of clothing causes the least impact on energy use and appears to be the most environmentally and socially friendly approach to sustainability efforts (Madsen et al, 2007). Remanufacture of clothing is currently practiced but at niche market levels, for it to have a broader impact, it needs to gain entry into the mass-market retail arena. Our goal is to understand how designers, manufacturers and retailers may work together in a remanufacturing process and to propose a new product development method for sustainable consumption of fashion. We, therefore end the paper by reflecting on implications for the potential mechanisms of the supply chain integration and how the large multinationals may become engaged. Keywords: textile recycling process, fashion value chain, reuse and remanufacture, socio-economic development

SMEs and environmental responsibility: a policy perspective

Environmental policies to promote environmentally-sustainable economic activity have often concentrated on larger firms. However, increasing attention is being paid to the role of SMEs and entrepreneurial actors. In this paper we examine how policy tools are being used to improve the environmental performance of SMEs and to redirect entrepreneurial energies in more environmentally-benign directions. The empirical section adopts a case-based comparative method to examine four instances of policy-making, drawn from different countries and industry sectors. The paper argues that while some interventions have proved effective in their own terms, better integrated approaches are required to address today’s complex and deep-rooted sustainability challenges. The paper identifies several policy implications including the need to: clarify the purpose of any intervention, address potential interactions and trade-offs; select appropriate tools based on informed reviews of the options; remain sensitive to context-specific factors, and to devise effective vehicles for the promotion and governance of entrepreneurial initiatives

Тематика курсовых работ по курсу "Конституционное право Республики Беларусь".

While the Middle East and North African (MENA) region is facing challenges to sustain water security, water reclamation has received increasing consideration as a favorable mitigating solution. Despite the availability of adequate technologies, economic, political, legal, social, and environmental constraints often hamper stakeholders, and especially decision makers, from exploiting the existing potential into solution implementation. In the present paper, a comprehensive assessment for water reclamation and reuse was developed. This assessment consisted of 4 objectives: 1) apply a decision‐support tool (DST) for water reclamation potential for municipal wastewater, 2) apply a DST for simulating and estimating the lifecycle costs of project‐related technologies for water reclamation (municipal and industrial wastewater, as well as drainage canal water), 3) assess the national‐level conditions for water reuse with a multicriteria decision analysis (MCA), and 4) establish exemplary strategies, barriers, and measures for water reuse. The present MCA considered 6 thematic subjects: policy and institution, economy, society, water management, legislation, and environment. The assessment was applied to food and nonfood crop irrigation in Egyptian, Moroccan, and Tunisian case studies. For all defined case studies, adapted treatment trains that could treat wastewater to the desired quality at reasonable costs were identified and are presented in the present paper. Results showed that technological options are available for water reuse, but the concept is not widely implemented in Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia. The present paper identifies key barriers and drivers for the implementation of water reclamation for irrigation. In particular, the considered countries showed different characteristics regarding efficient water management, water pricing, subsidies and wastewater tariffs, implementation of monitoring and reporting systems, or legal aspects regarding the use of reclaimed water for food crop irrigation. Further exploration of case studies on high potential water reuse and financially affordable wastewater reclamation, particularly case studies that explore the impacts of policies and practices across countries, would be useful for helping the MENA region improve their water security situation

The development of commercial local area resource and emissions modelling-navigating towards new perspectives and applications

Meeting near future UK greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions targets will require all parts of the UK economy to contribute, and in particular significant changes in business practices are required at the local level. From review it was found that there is a lack of detailed business accounting and reporting of GHG emissions at the local level, especially concerning supply chain impacts and small and medium sized enterprises. This paper presents a framework model to generate detailed benchmark estimates of GHGs (both on site and supply chain related) for individual businesses and all businesses of a sector within an area. The model makes use of available economic and environmental data, and, with similar datasets existing in other parts of the world, such models may be used elsewhere. The framework model is applied to an empirical case study. Estimates from such a framework can be used in a step-by-step approach to move businesses and local areas towards improved accounting, reporting and sustainability (including procurement). The model makes use of two different accounting perspectives: the production perspective (on site GHGs) and the provision perspective (supply chain GHGs attributable to purchased inputs of a business or sectors production). The new provision perspective and its consequences are explored and explained. Crown Copyright © 2012 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved