Addressing Supply Chain’s Circularity Through Simulation: Textile Waste Separate Collection Models

Every year, the textile industry produces vast quantities of textile waste, leading to environmental deterioration. This is primarily due to its conventional supply chain approach, marked by excessive production of virgin fibres and inefficient waste management practices favouring landfill disposal or incineration. Hence, a fundamental requirement for widespread adoption of sustainable practices by all stakeholders in the textile supply chain, including consumers, is the development and validation of circular models. These models should incorporate innovative systems for collecting, sorting, reusing, and recycling textiles, along with resilient configurations for circular supply chains in the textile industry. Given these premises, this paper aims to assess the effect, measured in terms of environmental performance, achievable by adopting advanced waste management models in the textile supply chain. Specifically, two agent-based simulation models of a “standard” and “innovative” collection system of household textile waste are presented and compared. Benefits of the innovative model are finally provided, along with possible managerial insights.