Sustainability Challenge:
Textile manufacturing requires large amounts of water and energy.
Chemistry Solution:
Chemistry innovates new dyes that require less water at lower temperatures and less salt.
Sustainability Benefit:
Huntsman's AVITERA® SE dyes reduce water consumption in textile manufacturing by up to 50 percent. Widespread adoption has the potential to save more than 820 billion liters of water a year.
Using less water is a top priority for the textile manufacturing industry, particularly since many major textile-producing nations, like India, Bangladesh and China, face water shortage issues.
That’s why textile producers are looking for new ways to reduce their overall environmental footprint, not only by conserving water, but also by reducing energy usage and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and producing less waste in the manufacturing process.
To address this need, specialty chemical company Huntsman has developed a new reactive dye solution to help textile manufacturers on their path to sustainability.
Huntsman’s AVITERA®SE dyes expand upon current best-available technologies, to reduce water consumption in textile manufacturing by up to 50 percent. With AVITERA®SE dye, manufacturers need 15 to 20 liters of water to dye 1 kilogram of material, compared to 30 to 40 liters for current best-available technology, and up to 100 liters for traditional hot dyeing systems.
Additionally, because this dye needs less salt to properly adhere to the textile, manufacturers use less water, at lower temperatures – 60°C compared to the conventional 98°C – with fewer rinsing baths, to wash off surplus dyes. The end result is the facility produces less wastewater, reduces both energy use and CO2 emissions.
According to Huntsman, widespread adoption of this textile dyeing innovation has the potential to save more than 820 billion liters of water a year, or 1.3 liters of fresh water per person per day, in major Asian textile processing countries.
