Approximately 60,000 tonnes of resilient flooring waste is generated annually in Australia, including 9,000 tonnes of unused installation waste. In 2021, the Australia Resilient Flooring Association (ARFA) sought to address the issue of nearly all resilient flooring waste being sent to landfill, due to limited recycling infrastructure, a lack of end markets for recyclates, and the high costs associated with collection and transportation for individual industry participants. ARFA launched the ResiLoop initiative, with its design funded by a grant from the Australian Government’s National Product Stewardship Investment Fund.
Following successful trials, ResiLoop was established as a separate legal entity in March 2024 to operate independently from ARFA.
The scheme is now operational and is open to all resilient flooring suppliers in the Australian market. Since the idea began ResiLoop has recycle over 50 tonnes of material in total, including trials.
Since 1st September, 2024 ResiLoop has delivered 15 tonnes of material to our manufacturing partner, Think Manufacturing. Think Manufacturing is using the material to make a garden edging product being stocked by a national retailer. Through our next stage of R&D we aim to find additional uses for resilient flooring waste that is currently going to landfill.
ResiLoop has accomplished a lot, evolving into a stand-alone entity with 16 leading suppliers from the resilient flooring industry as members and a growing number of Associate Members. The focus, however, remains on the future growth of the scheme - its contribution to the 2030 National Waste Policy Action Plan targets and its determination to drive a circular mindset in the floorcovering industry. With a carefully coordinated expansion of Collection Points underway and Think Manufacturing as our first recycling partner, ResiLoop has a solid foundation and a target going forward of 30T a month. Members recognise that R&D is critical to enabling us to recover and recycle increasing volumes of resilient flooring — achievable only through working together.