The German sportswear company Adidas announced this week that it would step up its fight against plastic waste, pledging to use only recycled polyester in its products from 2024 onwards. 

Adidas upping the use of recycled polyester 

In a statement, the international company announced that this year it will reach a “significant milestone on the road to sustainability”, with more than half of the polyester used in its products coming from plastic waste. Adidas also committed to using only recycled polyester across its entire product range by 2024. 

Additionally, the company expressed its intention to accelerate production of products made from ocean plastic. Last year, Adidas made more than 11 million pairs of shoes from plastic waste collected from beaches and coastal regions, but this year it will up its game. In 2020, the company plans to produce a record 15 to 20 million pairs of these shoes. 

Recycled materials and recyclable products

As well as increasing the use of recycled materials in production, Adidas announced that it is also “working on making products easy to recycle, with the goal of completely eliminating waste”. Its first fully-recyclable running shoe, named “Futurecraft Loop”, has been in the test phase since 2019 and looks set to hit stores in 2021.  

They’re not just investigating recyclable shoes, but clothing too: last year the company teamed up with Stella McCartney to develop a prototype of a tennis dress made of bio-fabricated materials based on cellulose and protein. Their subsidiary Rebook has already begun using renewable sources like cotton, corn, algae and natural rubber to produce footwear. 

Thumb photo credit: adidas