Reju, Goodwill spotlight Rochester’s growing role in textile circular economy

Leaders from Reju and Goodwill of the Finger Lakes spoke recently about Rochester’s growing leadership in textile circularity, highlighting partnerships designed to keep more textiles in productive use and plans to bring more jobs to the region.  

The Feb. 17 event at Goodwill’s clearance center in Henrietta comes on the heels of Reju’s announcement in January that it plans to invest $390 million to establish a textile regeneration hub at Eastman Business Park — its first facility in the Americas. 

“Rochester has a long history of industry leadership and that legacy will continue with Reju,” said Patrik Frisk, Reju’s president and CEO. 

He added that the company’s decision to operate in Rochester was made possible by collaboration between the nonprofit, for-profit, government and technology sectors.  

Frisk was joined by Jennifer Lake, president and CEO of Goodwill of the Finger Lakes; Steven Preston, president and CEO of Goodwill Industries International, and local dignitaries, to underscore how that local collaboration is advancing a more circular textile economy. 

Lake — who was instrumental in bringing Reju to the region starting with talks that began in late 2024 — said the business and nonprofit are working together to prioritize donation and reuse, improve diversion of nonwearable textiles and enable next-generation textile-to-textile regeneration as the system scales. 

She noted that Reju will address one of the fastest-growing yet least understood waste streams in the United States: post-use textiles.  

“Their breakthrough approach will divert discarded materials from landfills and transform them into valuable, sustainable resources, giving them new life,” she said.  

Lake also announced that the Northeast Goodwill Circularity Hub, a collective of eleven Goodwills, led by Goodwill of the Finger Lakes, has signed an agreement with Reju to supply polyester-rich materials to the regeneration hub.  

The collaboration builds on a multi-year initiative Reju and Goodwill launched in 2024 alongside Texas-based WM (formerly Waste Management) aimed at advancing textile circularity across North America. 

By strengthening collection, sorting and processing systems, the partners aim to reduce landfill waste while creating long-term economic and environmental value, noting the two aren’t mutually exclusive.  

Reju’s planned Rochester facility will sit on an 18.9-acre vacant lot at Eastman Business Park. Once operational, the company expects the plant to regenerate the equivalent of 300 million garments annually that would otherwise end up in landfills. 

The project is expected to create roughly 70 new jobs, including engineers, technicians, machinists and production roles, with additional ancillary jobs expected in the region and beyond. 

Reju anticipates being operational at the site by the end of 2029. 

Reju is owned by Technip Energies, a global engineering and technology company with more than 17,000 employees across 34 countries. The company has operated a pilot facility in Frankfurt, Germany since October 2024 and in May 2025 selected a site in the Netherlands for its first full-scale European operation. 

Through partnerships with global brands, mills and waste aggregators, Reju converts garments destined for landfill or incineration into yarns and fabrics ready for consumer use. 

Following remediation of the Rochester site, Reju plans to construct a 145,000-square-foot facility using proprietary technology developed with IBM Research. The process will initially focus on regenerating polyester textile waste into high-quality Reju Polyester. 

According to the company, the regenerated material carries a 50 percent lower carbon footprint than virgin polyester and is engineered to be recyclable multiple times, reducing reliance on fossil-based inputs. 

The project is receiving support from Empire State Development, which is providing a $4 million capital grant and offering up to $1 million in performance-based Excelsior Jobs Tax Credits tied to job creation commitments. Additional assistance comes from Monroe County, the city of Rochester and Greater Rochester Enterprise. 

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