Tex2mat – Next Level Textile Recycling With Biocatalysts

Abstract

Achieving a circular economy for end-of-life textiles is one of the big challenges in the textile industry. Currently, after disposal, textiles often end up in landfills or in incineration plants. Over the last years, the textile industry exhibited high growth rates and the annual global fibre production is reaching 100 Million t. It also has to be considered that textile products are increasingly becoming more complex, to fulfill special functionality resulting in the use of multi-material textiles. However, these textiles are hard to recycle. The TEX2MAT project is a FFG (Austrian Research Promotion Agency) promoted project conducted by a consortium of 13 research institutions and private businesses that offers a solution. The goal was to develop an innovative process for the material recycling of selected multi-material textile streams. In multiple case studies, pre- and post-consumer cotton/polyester textiles from the Austrian SME sector were investigated to close the material cycle from raw material back to raw material. The case studies used a new approach involving the enzymatic hydrolysis of cellulose. This way cotton can be converted into glucose and polyester remains as the only polymer and is thus accessible for a rather easy recycling process. The obtained glucose can be used as raw material for different platform chemicals. The project team successfully demonstrated the functionality of the whole processing chain, by complete removal of the cotton from the textile, and weaving of new towels with the recycled polyester.

Valorisation of cotton post-industrial textile waste into lactic acid: chemo-mechanical pretreatment, separate hydrolysis and fermentation using engineered yeast

“…For this set of tests, the amount of biomass used was 5.33% w/v in a final volume of 30 ml. The pre-treatment was conducted for 2 h at room temperature, without shaking as reported in literature studies [ 14 , 33 ]. To reach a pH 5 the samples were washed and then resuspended in citrate buffer 50 mM overnight.…”

“…Khandaker et al [ 8 ] reported that chemical (pre)treatments can determine efficient bioconversion thanks to the breaking of hydrogen bonds in cotton fibres, resulting in reduced crystallinity and increased amorphous region. For instance, Piribauer et al [ 14 ] reported that alkali pre-treatment of textile waste, combined with a previous mechanical pre-treatment, leads to an increased degradation of cotton in blended cotton-polyester garments up to 83% after enzymatic hydrolysis. Also, Vera et al demonstrated that mechanical pre-treatment in combination with chemical ozone and alkali pre-treatment resulted in glucose recovery yields of 90% after enzymatic hydrolysis [ 15 ].…”

Assessment of the Eco-Efficiency of the Circular Economy in the Recovery of Cellulose from the Shredding of Textile Waste

“…It stands out that very often, textile materials are discarded in landfill sites or incinerating plants [ 17 ], leading to serious environmental risks [ 18 ]. Meanwhile, to reduce environmental impacts, some companies have been adopting strategies to reuse the textile waste [ 19 ].…”

“…Cotton is one of the most important materials for textile production, but is has raised concerns about its environmental impacts, since its growth and cultivation require large volumes of water and pesticides and its manufacturing involves high levels of energy consumption [ 5 ]. Globally the production of fibres has been growing and reaching levels around 100 million of tons per year [ 17 ]. A large share of this production is directed to supply the textile industry that has also been registering important levels of production growth [ 29 ].…”