edge-research-reports / Webinar / Episode 7: The Mobility Frontier

Episode 7

Activating Textile Circularity: Experts Discuss How to Leverage New Opportunities for Growth and Sustainability in Mobility

Date: - August 6, 11:00 am EST
Time: - 50 minutes

The world is still on a “take-make-waste” mode, a linear-growth trajectory where products are bought, used, and then discarded in direct progression. Although little to no consideration for recycling or reuse is still happening globally, some changes are starting to become more visible.

Overflowing landfills, polluted waterways, compromised access to clean water, loss of biodiversity and deforestation are very much some of the major problems we will face for decades to come.

Yet, the slow but growing commitment to a more circular economy can’t be denied. This is particularly important when we look at carbon-rich textile waste coming, among other sources, from ground and aerospace vehicles.

How can the mobility sector leverage its capacity to mobilize ecologically minded designs, supply chains, financing mechanisms, consumer education, cross-sector activation, and more to capitalize on this “new source of carbon”, using it for a cleaner environment and better business initiatives?



Purchase Ann Lee-Jeffs and Joanna Safi’s, Edge Research Report

Speakers

Joanna Safi

Consultant, MBHAVE

Joanna Safi is a connector of interdisciplinary fields through different sectors and orga- nizations. She has collaborated in unlocking system-thinking frameworks for business transformation in different industries, such as retail, telecommunications, financial tech- nology, automotive, and aviation. With more than 15 years of experience, she has led the marketing strategy and digital transformations for corporations and start-ups to adapt to fast-paced consumer and market changes, driving innovation and holistic solutions. She has worked for multinationals including media and creative agencies (e.g., Initiative, Mediacom Communications Corporation, and DDB) and has lead marketing teams at Wingo, Virgin Mobile, Airtm, among others across Latin America.

With a background in Political Science and Biology, she has sculpted her career in marketing through a transformative lens to drive change and create a positive impact on business and the planet. She is passionate about driving change by collaborating with diverse teams across sectors and propelling business development through cutting-edge digital transformation, innovation, and her adaptive decision-making approach. Through her marketing positions, she has driven sustainability as part of corporate identity. She is a member of the Directory Board of Chief Marketing Officers of Colombia and different advisory boards. In 2023, she launched MSBHAVE, a consulting company focused on sustainability and digital transformation as a source of growth. She aspires to contribute to organizations at the vanguard of their industries, shaping a future where innovation meets responsibility.

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Ann Lee-Jeffs

CSO Impact Coordinator, MIT Professional Education

Ann is an engineer by training. She worked over 30 years to help multinational companies like Johnson & Johnson, Colgate Palmolive, Honeywell and Pfizer to be leaders in sustainability. Throughout her 30+ year of sustainability career, she activated collaborations to promote and advance green chemistry, healthcare plastic recycling and bioeconomy. She currently works for MIT Professional Education(PE) as a CSO Impact Coordinator to help executives to achieve the requirements of the MIT PE CSO certificate. She currently leads a network initiative to activate women CSOs with support of Forbes to take on audacious sustainability challenges such as textile and plastic circularity, in addition to promoting and advancing women in sustainability.

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Frank Menchaca

President, Sustainable Mobility Solutions

Frank Menchaca is President of Sustainable Mobility Solutions at SAE International, the oldest and largest technical organization for mobility engineering in ground and air transportation. Frank incubated and developed SAE’s work in sustainability and has also led the organization’s product development, marketing, information publishing, professional learning, events and international business. Frank has a deep background in information products and served as Executive Vice President at Cengage Learning. Frank holds degrees from New York University and Yale University and Chief Sustainability Officer certification from MIT. A musician and artist, Frank has released ten records of original music under his own name and in the duo Hourloupe; his visual art practice includes assemblage sculpture, painting, and digital media.

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Highlights:

 

  • How can AI help reduce our carbon footprint in this industry?

“I think AI is going to be the best tool possible throughout this lifecycle, throughout this whole supply chain. Not only from the design, which is one of the most important phases of all of the value chain, when you start to see how you are going to design the product to be as recyclable as possible to be able to change just a piece of a material to another without getting all of the materials out of the car or just destroying the car completely. I also think that consumer demand will also help all the industry be able to disclose all the information possible to make a better purchase decision. Not only on the battery side or the typical material part but also on the whole process throughout the value chain. Not to shift impact but to actually reduce impact in every part so I do think AI is going to be a huge a tool to help the people in the process reduce and make it tracible and transparent” – Joanna Safi

 

  • What is the state of the mobility industry in relation to textile circularity?

“Everyone is at a different trajectory. What I see as common denominator is a real desire for frameworks, and eventually standards. As a standards organization, SAE participates in all of that. What I think is really exciting and I think what this Edge report and other Edge reports have helped to do is to look upstream from standardization – where things have not been settled. Were doing things in many different ways and to bring a kind of structure the way Joanna and Ann really brought to thinking about textiles for the transportation industry. I think it’s a tremendous help.” – Frank Menchaca

 

  • How can we increase the use of textile circularity?

“Current state is were still activating circularity in a who you know and one-off way. And I think, I think SAE is super ideally conditioned to create not only collaboration across the OEM’s and suppliers but actively engage with, lets say, healthcare sector where all of their plastic whether from hospitals or from their manufacturing sites – a lot of that gets incinerated, especially in hospitals. I think theres a unique opportunity to really activate the CSO across the sectors um and start with mobility with healthcare. and start the conversation and show that this can be done so that best practices can be written and also theres a need for policy more policy and regulation and also incentives.” – Ann Lee-Jeffs

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