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The millions of tons of textile waste were produced every year. Most of them were made from polyester/cotton blended fabrics. The key technologies for recycling the waste blended fabrics were how to separate the blended components and then use the materials form the waste. Based on this, this research aimed to develop the technology of sustainable recycling of cotton fiber and polyester. The waste polyester/cotton blended fabric was first to cut into small pieces, then treated it with acid, and then used a grinder to crush it to separate the polyester from the cotton fiber. After the separation process, the cotton fiber was powder and the polyester fiber was fibrous mass. The components of the separated cotton samples were studied by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. The crystallinity of separated cotton fiber was analyzed by X-ray diffraction. The morphology of the separated cotton fiber and polyester were analyzed by scanning electron microscope. The particle size and potential of the cotton fiber after final treatment were analyzed by using the nanoparticle size and zeta potential analyzer. The results showed that the waste polyester/cotton blended fabric was successfully separated and the separated cotton fiber was successfully prepared into cotton nanocellulose for future use.

The Ji’an PM No. 3 is the first linerboard machine in China to use multilayer curtain coating technology. Since successful startup at the end of 2011, further development has been carried out to optimize running conditions, coating formulations, and the base paper to provide a product with satisfactory quality and lower cost to manufacture. The key challenges include designing the base board structure for the desired mechanical strength, designing the surface properties for subsequent coating operations, optimizing the high-speed running of the curtain coater to enhance production efficiency, minimizing the amount of titanium dioxide in the coating color, and balancing the coated board properties to make them suitable for both offset and flexographic printing. The pilot and mill scale results show that curtain coating has a major positive impact on brightness, while smoothness is improved mainly by the blade coating and calendering conditions. Optimization of base board properties and the blade + curtain + blade concept has resulted in the successful use of 100% recycled fiber to produce base board. The optical, mechanical, and printability properties of the final coated board meet market requirements for both offset and flexographic printing. Machine runnability is excellent at the current speed of 1000 m/min, and titanium dioxide has been eliminated in the coating formulations without affecting the coating coverage. A significant improvement in the total cost of coated white liner production has been achieved, compared to the conventional concept of using virgin fiber in the top ply. Future development will focus on combining low cost with further quality improvements to make linerboard suitable for a wider range of end-use applications, including frozen-food packaging and folding boxboard.