Published: August 29, 2024
With their new technology Looper, Croatian firm Indeloop is converting textile waste into clean fuel
In May, the Croatian R&D company Indeloop (part of the DOK-ING Group) announced it had completed tests on a new power plant called Looper. The plant takes non-recyclable, organic waste materials like certain plastics, sewage sludge and medical waste and converts them into hydrogen. In other words, it deals with stubborn waste in an eco-friendly way while producing a source of clean energy.
“With technology like Looper, we actually make the waste useful and of service to the society producing it,” Danica Maljkovic, director of energy and sustainability in DOK-ING Group, tells EMEA Finance. “Our innovation offers an environmentally friendly and carbon-free energy source.”
One of the key uses for the plant will be textile waste, which poses a huge and growing problem. With the clothing industry more and more dominated by ‘fast fashion’, a trend to discard cheap clothes that may only be worn a handful of times, people are disposing of textiles at far higher rates than before. According to the European Environment Agency, the average person in the EU generated 16kg of textile waste in 2020, up from 10.1kg in 2003.
Much of that waste ends up in landfill, where it can take 200 years to break down. Alternatively, it is incinerated, at considerable cost to the environment. Globally, only 1% of the clothing we wear is recycled to make new clothes.
“Overall, we are looking at a pretty non-efficient system of waste management that results in pollution and missed opportunities, essentially making waste a tangible problem,” comments Maljkovic, who also serves as a board member of Hydrogen Europe. “Our technology not only reduces waste by 99%, but also secures local energy independence and unlocks new market opportunities.”
A carbon negative effect of 108%
The Looper project is an example of something called waste-to-hydrogen (or waste2hydrogen) technology, which is being billed as an important prong of the energy transition and circular economy. While there are several different techniques in development, all abide by roughly the same principles.
Hydrogen is one of the fuels of the future with the International Energy Agency estimating that global hydrogen demand could exceed 200 million tons a year by 2030.