4.25.13 | Calgary, AB | Calgary-based DIRTT Environmental Solutions Ltd. and its Distribution Partners (DPs) across North America kept more than 500 pounds of denim out of landfills through their 2013 Earth Day drive to give jeans a new (and better) home. 

DIRTT, its DPs and about three dozen of the DPs’ clients in Calgary, Phoenix, Savannah, San Francisco and Portland collected and donated gently used jeans to local Goodwill Industries International thrift stores. Jeans that were on their last legs will be recycled into cotton fiber insulation used in DIRTT’s customized prefab interior construction solutions.
The split between reusable and recyclable jeans was roughly 50-50.

While the jeans drive was designed to support annual Earth Day efforts to raise awareness of environmental issues, the level of participation – and how the project grew in scope – strongly reflect DIRTT’s dedicated focus to being Green. Several locations extended their drives past Earth Day. One client added jeans donation bins to their company’s drive to collect old electronics, household items, books and clothing. In Georgia, the DIRTT DP arranged to “swap“, the gently used jeans for any unsellable jeans Goodwill already had on hand. And in Calgary, when one DIRTT employee told the family about the drive, her mother produced a plastic bag of jeans that had been bound for the garbage bin.

“We’ve used recycled denim for insulation in the workspaces we build for some time now,” says DIRTT Business Development’s Julie Pithers. “However, we believe recycling should always be a last-ditch effort to do the right thing. Reducing waste in the first place and reusing what you can is best. That’s why we partnered with Goodwill, so we could find new homes for any usable jeans that were donated. The rest we’ll get back in shipments of insulation for our solutions.”

Sustainability and community involvement are driving principles at DIRTT. All of its production facilities take up minimal real estate and carbon footprints, and have robust energy conservation and recycling programs. Its ICE® 3D software removes the need for paper catalogues and costly mockups; avoids design errors; and minimizes material waste and energy use in the production process.