{"id":43512,"date":"2026-04-02T13:32:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T13:32:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/43512\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T13:32:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T13:32:08","slug":"for-syres-circular-polyester-ambitions-teamwork-is-dreamwork","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/43512\/","title":{"rendered":"For Syre’s Circular Polyester Ambitions, Teamwork is Dreamwork"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThe way Syre<\/a> CEO Dennis Nobelius sees it, if there\u2019s any sliver of a silver lining in Iran\u2019s Strait of Hormuz blockade, it\u2019s that surging crude oil and natural gas prices have also driven the cost of virgin polyester to unprecedented highs.<\/p>\n

\n\tWith major suppliers hiking fiber prices by 25 percent or more over the past month, the margin between textile\u2011to\u2011textile recycled polyester and its conventional counterpart\u2014once a yawning chasm\u2014no longer seems so insurmountable after all. And while the chokepoint will eventually clear and business as usual resume, fashion brands feeling the squeeze from petrochemical-derived inputs are taking notice in a way they hadn\u2019t before.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cBrands don\u2019t like volatility,\u201d Nobelius said. \u201cThat\u2019s a benefit to us because our feedstock isn\u2019t related to oil being dug from the ground, so we can disconnect a bit from that. Moving forward, that\u2019s something we see as a valuable contribution in our discussions with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile Nobelius declined to say how much of an edge regular polyester typically has over Syre<\/a>\u2019s circular polyester, or cPET, cost-wise\u2014it depends on factors like uptake agreements, feedstock contributions and scale, he said\u2014recent developments have also bolstered the business case for apparel makers beyond the usual sustainability marketing.<\/p>\n

\n\tNot that the Swedish startup has struggled to attract interest. Backed by TPG Rise Climate, Volvo Car AB, Giant Ventures, Norrsken VC and the IMAS Foundation, the innovator has already secured enough high-profile strategic partners\u2014including H&M Group, Nike<\/a>, Gap Inc. and Target\u2014to unlock new financing for its first commercial-scale plant, most likely in Vietnam<\/a>\u2019s Gia Lai province, where it aims to crank out 150,000 metric tons of cPET a year.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut first, Nobelius said, Syre needs to resolve how to ship textile waste into the Southeast Asian nation, which restricts imports<\/a> of used clothing yet cannot muster the quantities the factory will need alone. So far, discussions with Prime Minister Ph\u1ea1m Minh Ch\u00ednh and his government appear headed for a breakthrough, he said. If momentum holds, construction could begin next year, with full operations firing on all cylinders by 2028.<\/p>\n

\n\tMore pieces began falling into place this week. On Tuesday, Syre announced a memorandum of understanding with ABB, the Swedish-Swiss tech giant that specializes in electrification and automation\u2014both critical to running the plant. Under the MOU, the two companies will figure out how to adapt ABB technologies such as distributed control systems, digital industrial software and \u201csource to socket\u201d electricity distribution to Syre\u2019s specific needs while boosting resource efficiency. In one promising sign, ABB\u2019s pulp and paper division has been renamed the pulp, paper and fiber division.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThat\u2019s a great testament to the work we\u2019re doing together,\u201d Nobelius said. \u201cTo automate such a big plant, it needs to function perfectly\u2014quality and precision need to be there at all times. And I think they could actually reduce our energy consumption, improve our yield and secure continuous flow without interruptions.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThursday saw another partnership reveal: this time with JEPLAN Group, a midsized environmental service firm whose name derives from Japan Environment Planning.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThey\u2019re coming more from an operations perspective,\u201d Nobelius said. \u201cWhat does it take to run such a plant? What fine-tuning optimization do you need to be able to operate at scale? That\u2019s the kind of expertise they\u2019re bringing. And one area I\u2019m personally intrigued by is how to secure byproducts from our plant so they end up in new products, closing that loop.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAlso useful is JEPLAN\u2019s Kitakyushu-based PET chemical recycling plant, which includes demonstration and semi-industrial units for testing and scaling chemical recycling technologies.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe feeling is mutual: \u201cSyre\u2019s ambition, business backbone and global reach in technology integration\u2014combined with our extensive chemical recycling experience\u2014create a powerful platform for accelerating breakthrough solutions for the textile industry,\u201d Masaki Takao, CEO of JEPLAN, said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\n\tNobelius is candid about why the company is leaning on outside help. \u201cWe\u2019re not the best at everything,\u201d he admitted. \u201cAnd we recognize the different types of expertise out there in the world.\u201d Going solo instead of tapping what already exists would stall plans by at least 10 years, he added.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe see ourselves as technology agnostic because we\u2019re not the tech founders,\u201d Nobelius said. \u201cWe\u2019re not tied to certain technology and a certain application that needs to be a certain way. If we find something better that gives us speed or scale, we\u2019ll go with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tRight now, Syre believes its glycolysis-based approach, which converts polyester waste into high-quality BHET monomers for repolymerizing into new yarn, has the highest odds of success at scale, volume and\u2014yes\u2014cost competitiveness. But it isn\u2019t easy being a pioneer; creating feedstock flows that don\u2019t currently exist remains a challenge. So is formalizing what has traditionally been a fragmented informal sector, ensuring decent jobs in the process.<\/p>\n

\n\tEven so, Vietnam<\/a> is only the launchpad for bigger ambitions\u2014Indonesia, Portugal or India could be next. By 2032, Nobelius said, Syre hopes to have 10-12 gigascale production plants running at full tilt, collectively churning out 3 million metric tons of cPET a year.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cRight now, we\u2019re focused on Vietnam to get that up and running,\u201d Nobelius said. \u201cBut we\u2019re also eyeing where the next opportunity could be\u2014scaled plants or smaller plants we could launch on a brownfield, perhaps. That is something we\u2019re scouting all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWar or no war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The way Syre CEO Dennis Nobelius sees it, if there\u2019s any sliver of a silver lining in Iran\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43513,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[130],"tags":[232,24888,24704,24998,19944],"class_list":["post-43512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-abb","tag-abb","tag-recycled-textiles","tag-syre","tag-textile-recycling","tag-vietnam"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/116335368220155191","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43512\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}