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Person wearing a grey shirt with The Loop Factory logo holds a yellow fibrous insulation material in their hand, standing on a grey concrete floor.
 

Ceilings4LIFE
Closing the loop

 

Saint-Gobain Ecophon is proud to lead Ceilings4LIFE (C4L), a new European LIFE project dedicated to creating a fully circular value chain for glass wool ceiling and wall absorbers. With a budget of €3 million – including €1.8 million in EU funding – the project sets out to recycle post-consumer products without remelting the fibers, reducing both waste and carbon emissions.

 
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Why this matters

Each year, some 2.5 million tons of mineral wool waste are generated in Europe, with ceiling and wall absorbers accounting for approximately 10%. Currently, the majority is sent to landfill.

 

C4L will change this by:

  • Building a circular value chain – developing efficient material flows and logistics for post-consumer acoustic products.
  • Scaling Refiber™ technology – producing high-quality ceiling solutions from recycled materials.
  • Reducing carbon emissions – reaching a production capacity of 793 tons of Refiber™ baseboards per year, with up to 93% recycled content, reducing emissions by 714 tons CO2 eq. annually.
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Read the project summary
A person wearing a grey shirt holds three yellow insulation foam panels, each rectangular and thin, stacked in one hand.

 

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The C4L project not only addresses the urgent challenge of waste management but also brings us closer to our mission: becoming the first net-zero acoustic solutions manufacturer through transparency and innovation.

Ola Karlsson, Sustainability & Innovation Director,
Saint-Gobain Ecophon AB

A circular flowchart illustrating a recycling process: Landfill, Dismantling, Usage, Installation, Manufacturing, Product Design, Recycling, and back to Dismantling, featuring a reuse arrow between Recycling and Installation.

Closing the loop on glass wool

The C4L project aims to establish a circular value chain for glass wool acoustic ceiling and wall panels by recycling end of life material through innovative Refiber™ technology, significantly reducing carbon emissions and promoting sustainability in the construction industry.

The Refiber™ technology converts post-consumer materials into premium acoustic solutions without remelting the fibers.

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View C4L in the LIFE database

Powered by collaboration

The project consortium unites expertise across the construction and demolition value chain:

  • The Loop Factory
  • ZAG (Zavod za gradbeništvo Slovenije)
  • TREE Capital Poland (Sp.Z.O.O)
  • Saint-Gobain Construction Products Polska
  • Saint-Gobain Ecophon AB

Together, we aim to create a scalable, sustainable solution for the entire industry.

Map of Europe showing locations of four companies: The Loop Factory (Process Development, Sweden), Ecophon (Manufacturing, Sweden; Replication, Hungary), TREE (Demolition & Waste Management, Czech Republic), ZAG (Performance Testing, Slovenia).

Expected results of the project:

  • Establishment of a circular value chain for glass wool acoustic ceiling and wall panels, including efficient post-consumer material flows and logistics services.
  • Demonstration that post-consumer sound absorbers can be recycled into new sound absorbers while maintaining their original performance.
  • Scale-up of Refiber™ technology from TRL6 to TRL8, enabling a low-energy recycling process that avoids glass melting, supported by a pilot facility in Sweden.
  • Annual production capacity of 793 tonnes of Refiber™ baseboards, with 86% derived from recycled raw materials.
  • Reduction of approximately 714 tonnes of CO₂eq emissions per year compared to conventional baseboard manufacturing.
  • Validation of scalability and a replication roadmap, beginning in Poland and later expanding to additional European locations.
  • Strong stakeholder engagement to ensure market fit, acceptance, and uptake of recycled sound absorbers.
  • Development of End-of-Waste guidelines for acoustic panel waste.
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View project results

 

Coordinator contact details:

Anna-Karin Grimshorn, Senior Project Manager

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Get in touch
Ecophon Saint-Gobain logo in yellow and black, next to a round C4L Ceilings for Life logo with yellow and black accents on a white background.
Logo featuring the EU flag and the word “Life” next to the text “Co-funded by the European Union” on a white background.

Co-funded by the European Union under grant agreement No 101216180. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or CINEA. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.