’s-Hertogenbosch, 8 May 2025 – Waste-to-product company Renewi and circular innovator PeelPioneers have extended their partnership for another three years. With this renewed contract, both parties commit to further scaling up and increasing impact. In the coming years, they aim to grow the volume of collected and processed orange peels — helping to prevent even more food waste.
Growing in impact and circularity
Since the start of the collaboration in 2018, over 60 million kilos of orange peels have been collected and successfully upcycled into new, high-quality ingredients. This not only creates value, but also contributes significantly to CO₂ reduction, as the peels are no longer incinerated.
In the past three years alone, PeelPioneers has processed over 35,000 tons of orange peels, resulting in a CO₂ reduction of 26,000 tons.
This equals the annual CO₂ absorption of approximately 10,300 hectares of mature forest.
“Many companies talk about circularity — PeelPioneers puts it into action,” says Jan-Pedro Vis, Director Circular Materials at Renewi.
“They prove that waste has value. That’s exactly the kind of innovation we believe in.”
“Without partners like Renewi, we wouldn’t be able to fulfil our mission,” says Bas van Wieringen, CEO and Co-Founder of PeelPioneers.
“They ensure a consistent flow of orange peels for us to process. Together, we give real meaning to the circular economy — and make a tangible difference.
From waste stream to visible end product
For every glass of freshly squeezed orange juice consumed, the same weight in peel ends up as waste. In the Netherlands alone, this adds up to around 20 million kilos of orange peels per year, mainly from hospitality and supermarkets.
PeelPioneers is the first company in the world to fully upcycle this stream into new ingredients — and those ingredients are already visible in the market. Examples include:
-
Fiber used as an egg replacement in plant-based mayonnaise from Mayoneur
-
Oil from orange peels used as a fragrance in Seepje cleaning products
-
Aromatic extracts used as flavouring in beer from Amsterdam brewery Two Chefs Brewing