As biodegradable/compostable cotton-based nonwovens are sustainable materials, there is increasing interest in them, with the expansion of nonwovens into novel applications. Over the past few years, research has been done at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville to produce and evaluate nonwoven products containing cotton/cellulose acetate fibers. Nonwoven fabrics manufactured from cotton and Eastar, a biodegradable thermoplastic fiber have shown great promise. The production of nonwovens by the thermal bonding process from such compositions, and the structure and properties of the resulting products are investigated. The results have shown that, by appropriately selecting the combination of fibers and process conditions, nonwoven fabrics with good performance properties can be produced.

Environmentally friendly nonwoven fabrics can be formed through thermal bonding of cotton and cellulose acetate fiber blends at reduced bonding temperature with the aid of a plasticizer. Water has been introduced as an external plasticizer to lower the softening temperature of cellulose acetate fibers and to enhance the tensile strength of cotton/cellulose acetate web. It has been found that water can significantly increase the tensile strength of cotton/cellulose acetate thermally-bonded webs at reasonable bonding temperatures. In addition, water can enhance web bonding to essentially the same degree as an acetone treatment does. The mechanisms of water effect are considered and optimal processing conditions are proposed.

Cotton-based nonwovens are generally produced by carding and then bonding. One of the most important characteristics of nonwoven materials is the uniformity of their structure and properties. However, the carded webs always have irregularities caused by processing and material variables. The binder fiber distribution in carded cotton-based nonwoven fabrics was analyzed based on the crystallization behavior of one of the components of the binder fibers by DSC. The effects of process parameters, such as bonding temperature and binder fiber component, on the uniformity were discussed in detail in this article. Also, the relationship of binder fiber distribution and the strip tensile property and single-bond tensile strength were investigated. The results showed that if the binder fibers were not well distributed in the fabric, it would be hard to get the same trend of temperature effect on tensile property for the strip and single-bond tests.

In this paper, we investigate the effect of thermal calendering temperature, binder fiber type, and binder fiber component (blend ratio) on the tensile strength of resulting thermal point-bonded nonwovens. The experimental results are statistically analyzed using the general linear models procedure in JMP 5.0 to determine the significance of the effects of the variables on fabric strength. Based on the interactions of binder fiber composition and bonding temperature, empirical models are developed to predict the breaking loads of webs.

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