Cutting emissions where it matters most

For decades, actors across the textile industry have implemented innovative technologies, novel materials and recycling schemes to lower emissions and reduce waste. While all these initiatives matter, the potential impact is marginal when matched against the emissions generated in fabric processing and dyeing.

Fact is, 65 percent of the entire industry’s emissions come from dye houses, finishing mills and production facilities. However, for most suppliers, making the switch from coal to clean energy or betting on an innovative solution, requires vast amounts of capital and commitments from brands and partners. Something that’s rarely available.

This is where the Future Forward Factories and Fashion Climate Fund come into play.

Future Forward Factories, driven by Fashion for Good, develops open-source blueprints showing how a factory can transition from outdated machinery and fossil fuels to high-impact innovations and fossil-free solutions. It’s an initiative born from the ambition to break barriers to innovation, and prove how low-carbon chemistry, machinery and infrastructure work in practice.

For suppliers, Future Forward Factories offers access to blueprints consisting of data drawn from the initiative’s demonstration facilities. These open-source blueprints are made to be replicated to fit the unique conditions, context and region of each supplier.

Future Forward Factories provides suppliers with a practical pathway to transform their operations towards near-net-zero. With lower energy, water and emissions, plus access to partnerships, suppliers win both climate leadership and business returns.

Katrin Ley, Managing Director at Fashion for Good

While Fashion Forward Factories proves how decarbonisation works in practice by offering replicable blueprints, Fashion Climate Fund helps make them possible to implement across thousands of factories.

Fashion Climate Fund, driven by the Apparel Impact Institute, tackles the financial side of the green transition and uses blended capital from philanthropy, brands and public funding. Its purpose is to lower the risk for suppliers to, for example, replace coal boilers with heat pumps, solar thermal and other fossil-free technologies. Alongside finance, suppliers also receive technical support and training to ensure changes stick.

Suppliers can gain the confidence and support they need to adopt decarbonisation solutions without carrying all the risk.

Lewis Perkins, President Apparel Impact Institute

“The Fashion Climate Fund pools funding from across the industry and philanthropy to catalyze climate action at the factory level. Suppliers can be nominated by brands or reach out to Aii directly. Once a project is verified for CO₂ reduction and approved for next steps, we can use these pooled funds to provide grants in the form of rebates, cover the cost of technical assistance, and connect suppliers with financing partners. By closing this gap, suppliers gain the confidence and support they need to adopt decarbonisation solutions without carrying all the risk,” says Lewis Perkins, President Apparel Impact Institute.

Together, these initiatives aim to close two crucial gaps: one proves that change is technically possible, the other that it’s financially viable. Both initiatives also take the most important piece of the puzzle into account – people.

Because with new technology, operations change, and workers need to adapt. Skills training, job redesign and social protection are essential if decarbonisation is to strengthen livelihoods, not threaten them. Future Forward Factories’ blueprints don’t just show how to upgrade machinery, but also how to strengthen the capabilities of those who operate them.

While these are far from the first projects aiming to decarbonise tier 2 emissions, these are two initiatives already scaling in practice – with set goals for 2030.

• 7 open-source blueprints for near net-zero factories
• 7 demonstrator facilities operating with significant emission reductions and water savings
• 60+ supplier transformations, adopting full or partial blueprints
• 100+ low-impact technology installations in tier 2 facilities

• With adequate financing, Aii’s programs could enable 30–50 million tonnes of CO₂ cut across factories in Asia, equal to taking 10 million cars off the road for a year
• Through financing and project support role, Aii aims to help thousands of factories supported in replacing coal boilers with clean energy technologies (heat pumps, solar thermal, biomass, etc.)

When working together, these two projects show how systemic transformation can be unlocked when practical blueprints are paired with financing at scale.

Tier 1: Assembly and manufacturing of finished products
Tier 2: Production and finishing of materials
Tier 3: Processing of raw materials into yarn
Tier 4: Extraction of raw materials
Use / end-of-life: Consumer care and disposal
Logistics & transport: Runs across all stages