Recycling textiles can be challenging due to their blended materials, such as spandex or dyes, which are hard to isolate and purify. However, thanks to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Technology Transitions (OTT) Energy I-Corps initiative, t
October 27, 2023
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Recycling textiles can be challenging due to their blended materials, such as spandex or dyes, which are hard to isolate and purify. However, thanks to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Technology Transitions (OTT) Energy I-Corps initiative, two dynamic young scientists are coming up with solutions for textile recycling.
Energy I-Corps is an immersive training program that helps researchers and scientists bring innovative technologies to market. Dr. Mikhail Konev and Dr. Kevin Sullivan are research chemists from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory who began their entrepreneurial journey in Energy I-Corps in 2021.
Konev and Sullivan are on a mission to enable recycling circularity within the fashion and textile industries. With funding support from DOE’s Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO), their Denver-based start-up Tereform is developing a novel chemical strategy that can transform waste textile materials back into the chemical building blocks for reuse.
Read more about Tereform and its co-founders, and the milestones they have achieved through the Energy I-Corps program.
Energy I-Corps is a key initiative of the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Technology Transitions (OTT), which provides teams of researchers and industry mentors with immersive two-month training to help researchers define technology value propositions, conduct stakeholder discovery interviews, and develop viable market pathways for their technologies. To learn more, visit the Energy I-Corps' website To learn more about Tereform, please visit https://www.tereform.com/.