PESCO-UP workshop at the ECOSYSTEX conference

Last week, TEXroad had the pleasure of co-hosting a workshop at the ECOSYSTEX conference in Gothenburg, Sweden, together with our PESCO-UP partners.

Our session invited participants to to assess real-world readiness and strategic opportunities to accelerate circular models.

Speakers:
- Carla Fité Galan Fite Galan, Business Development and Programme Manager, Reverse Resources
- Traci Kinden, Director, TEXroad
- Satu-Marja Mäkelä, Senior Scientist, VTT

Key takeaways:

The role of ontologies was a relevant topic of discussion, validating the importance of PESCO-UP’s work to model the recycling value chain and define minimum data requirements. Misalignment still exists due to the lack of common ontologies, but the main goal remains mutual understanding. Standards are helpful, yet mapping and shared understanding are equally important for effective communication.

Data availability received strong feedback: experts across the recycling value chain generally have access to relevant data points, but confidentiality concerns continue to limit full digitization and information sharing. Building secure, trustworthy systems is essential to foster collaboration in a sector with fragile business models and competitive sensitivities.

Value chain modelling is seen by companies and experts as essential for enabling circular operations.

The learnings will be integrated into the PESCO-UP results to validate and strengthen the value chain model.

A big thank you to the Textile ETP team for organizing, and to everyone who joined the discussion on scaling circularity!