Reju, the textile-to-textile regeneration company owned by Technip Energies, said it has validated its polyester depolymerization process across virgin material and both post-industrial and post-consumer textile waste, as it advances plans for its first industrial-scale plant in the Netherlands.
The update, published on Wednesday in the company’s autumn newsletter, The Reju Review, marks a milestone for a sector that has struggled to move textile recycling from pilot projects to commercial volumes.
Regeneration Hub Zero in Frankfurt has now run for a year since producing its first rBHET, a recycled building block for polyester. The facility recently completed its first major maintenance and optimization shutdown, which required more than 6,500 engineering hours. Reju said the work strengthened operational performance and generated experience that will inform future regeneration hubs. It described the three-feedstock validation as an important step in its Technology Readiness Level process and in its ambition to scale textile-to-textile regeneration.
The company opened its first North American research and development center in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, in July, and in January selected Eastman Business Park in Rochester, New York, for its first U.S. industrial facility. Reju says its technology, which originated at IBM Research and was developed with Technip Energies, yields polyester with a carbon footprint about 50% lower than virgin material.
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Attention now turns to Regeneration Hub One at Chemelot in the Netherlands. Reju said it is deepening collaboration with Dutch partners, and representatives from the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs, the Netherlands Foreign Investment Agency and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency visited Hub Zero to discuss the technology and plans for industrial-scale regeneration. Reju executives attended Circular Textile Days in the Netherlands and visited Brightlands Circular Space, where Chief Executive Patrik Frisk met its chair, Lia Voermans. The newsletter gave no capacity, investment or start-up timeline for Hub One.
In an essay marking two years since Reju was announced, Frisk argued that geopolitical upheaval has strengthened the case for textile circularity. When the company launched, he wrote, its business case rested on post-consumer textile waste combined with ESG targets and the regulation that followed. Today, he said, a shift toward regionalization and tariffs has added new dimensions around strategic secondary raw materials and critical molecules. He cautioned that the industry has not fully registered why it is being regulated, and flagged risks for polyester including emission costs for incineration and possible regulation treating molecules as a critical resource.
Frisk also pointed to the United States, where he said Extended Producer Responsibility could accelerate. Citing the Product Stewardship Institute, he said 150 EPR laws have been enacted across 34 states and Washington, DC, covering 22 product categories, including packaging, electronics, batteries and carpets, with carpet legislation established in California and New York State.
Reju carried the same themes to industry gatherings. As a title sponsor of Textile Exchange Conference 2026 in Vancouver, Frisk spoke on what the company calls the Waste Gap, the widening distance between the volume of textiles becoming waste and the infrastructure available to recover and regenerate them. He called for coordinated investment, effective regulation and stronger collaboration across the value chain.
At Climate Week NYC, Head of Product James Peterson attended a textile education day organized by NYSAR3 on Sept. 22, while Reju staff at Performance Days in Munich discussed regenerated polyester with manufacturers and brands alongside ongoing yarn and fabric trials with supply chain partners. In Brussels, the company engaged policymakers on Extended Producer Responsibility, recycling infrastructure and the need for reliable demand for recycled materials.
Reju said its focus for the rest of 2026 remains on building the relationships, technologies and infrastructure needed to turn post-consumer textile waste into a valuable resource.