From the Sector

The Lenzing Group has been awarded Platinum status in EcoVadis’ CSR rating. The assessment comprehensively covers the four main CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) practices: the environment, fair working conditions and human rights, as well as ethics and sustainable procurement.

In the previous three years, Lenzing had already received outstanding ratings in all categories, and was awarded Gold status in 2018, 2019 and 2020. “We are very proud to have now achieved the step up to the Platinum level after several Gold ratings in the past few years. At Lenzing, we always think beyond fibres and take responsibility for our children and grandchildren – for whom we do our best in order to constantly improve ourselves. This attitude forms part of our strategic principles and we will continue to work hard to make a sustainable contribution to the environment and to society”, notes Stefan Doboczky, CEO of the Lenzing Group.

The Lenzing Group’s ambitious climate targets form an essential part of its strategy and responsibility to future generations. In 2019, Lenzing became one of the world’s first fiber manufacturers to commit to reducing CO2 emissions per ton of product by 50 percent by 2030, and even becoming climate-neutral by 2050. The Science Based Targets Initiative, a recognised organisation in the area of climate-relevant target-setting, has scientifically validated Lenzing’s climate targets.

This scientific validation also forms one of the essential criteria that EcoVadis highlights in its rating. In addition, the responsible procurement of raw materials – according to social and ecological aspects – was also highlighted as a further core element in the company’s sustainability strategy, as well as support for external environmental initiatives (Sustainable Apparel Coalition, Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action) and initiatives on labour and human rights issues (Sustainable Apparel Coalition).

International technology Group ANDRITZ will be presenting its innovative nonwovens production and textile solutions at ANEX/SINCE 2021 in Shanghai, China, from July 22 to 24, 2021. The product portfolio covers state-of-the-art nonwovens and textile production technologies such as air-through bonding, needlepunch, spunlace, spunbond, wetlaid/Wetlace, converting, textile finishing, airlay, recycling, and bast fiber processing.

Among the largest end-use markets for nonwoven products are materials for durable uses. Interior linings for cars, materials for construction, geotextiles, synthetic leathers for clothing and furniture, carpeting, filtration and many other industries rely on the use of nonwovens produced using the needlepunch method.

ANDRITZ Nonwoven’s processes play a pioneering role in the production of biodegradable materials. For many years, ANDRITZ has offered different processes, like spunlace, Wetlace and Wetlace CP, all with one goal in mind: Elimination of plastic components while maintaining the high quality of the desired product properties. Such processes achieve high performance entirely with plastic-free raw materials. The added benefit of using a blend of fibers, like wood pulp, short-cut cellulosic fibers, viscose, cotton, hemp, bamboo or linen, without chemical additives results in a 100% sustainable fabric, thus meeting customers’ needs exactly as well as supporting the strong tendency to move away from plastics and synthetics.

The latest development in this field is the ANDRITZ neXline wetlace CP line. This process combines the benefits of two forming technologies (inline drylaid and wetlaid web forming process) with bonding by hydroentanglement. Natural fibers, like pulp or viscose, can be processed smoothly and generate a high-performance and cost-efficient wipe that is fully biodegradable and plastic-free.

• New air purification and sulfur recovery plant up and running at the Lenzing facility
• Another step closer to meeting sustainability and climate targets
• Self-sufficiency in raw materials further enhanced

Lenzing Group is continuing to make great strides toward achieving carbon neutrality across the Group. The successful completion and commissioning of an air purification and sulfur recovery plant at the Lenzing facility marks another milestone in the Group’s ambitious strategy. Lenzing has invested some EUR 40 mn in this project since construction began in 2019.

Using state-of-the-art technology, the plant will enable carbon emissions to be reduced by 15,000 metric tons at the Lenzing facility. This will also make the group more self-sufficient in securing vital raw materials for processing, which will bolster the site’s competitive standing in terms of sustainability.

“As a result of this investment, Lenzing has made further progress towards implementing its climate targets, while achieving much greater autonomy with regard to one of its core raw materials”, says Christian Skilich, Member of the Managing Board at Lenzing Group.

In 2019, Lenzing set the strategic target of halving its group-wide greenhouse gas emissions per ton of product by 2030. Its goal for 2050 is to achieve climate neutrality.

ISKO announced the launch of bluesign® APPROVED fabrics. The only denim mill in Europe with bluesign® APPROVED fabrics, and one of the highest achievement’s in sustainability. This won honour is only awarded to those that meet the strict safety and environmental requirements of the bluesign® CRITERIA. These certified articles are made from bluesign® APPROVED chemicals and raw materials, and are manufactured with a minimum impact on people and the environment. This enables brands to provide safe products to their consumers, verified as bluesign® PRODUCT, which are sustainably produced without hazardous chemicals.

“When the goal is big, the effort is big. Choosing the right partner means taking safe steps. In this sense, I can gladly say that we will continue on our way with the bluesign® chemical followup process.” – Ebru ÖZKÜÇÜK, Head of Sustainability ISKO.

Through this partnership and certification, ISKO and bluesign® continue their vision of a textile and fashion industry with a future that focuses more attention on people and the environment, because only when both are considered can the industry truly make a positive, long-lasting impact.

• PrimaLoft and Origin Materials have launched a program to develop high-performance, carbon-negative insulating fibers for diverse apparel applications, including for leading outdoor, fashion, and lifestyle brands, as well as home goods applications such as hypoallergenic insulated bedding.
• PrimaLoft, an advanced material technology company and a world leader in the development of high-performance insulations and fabrics, will develop the fibers with Origin Materials to address demand for sustainable, high-performance materials from its over 900 global brand partners. PrimaLoft iconic brand partners include Patagonia, Stone Island, L.L. Bean, Lululemon, adidas and Nike.
• The program will focus on carbon-negative PET and next-generation polymers produced by the Origin Materials patented technology platform, which turns sustainable wood residue into cost-advantaged, carbon-negative materials that reduce the need for fossil resources.

Origin Materials, Inc. (“Origin Materials”), a leading carbon negative materials company, and PrimaLoft, an advanced material technology company and a leader in the development of high-performance insulations and fabrics, announced a new program to develop carbon-negative, insulating, high-performance fibers. The fibers will be used across a diverse array of end products, including insulating fiber for leading outdoor, fashion, and lifestyle brands, as well as home goods applications such as hypoallergenic insulated bedding.

The companies will work to rapidly develop and commercialize new products derived from Origin Materials’ platform. The collaboration will leverage the leadership position of PrimaLoft as a specialty producer of insulating fibers and filaments with over 900 global brand partners, as well as a large global network of manufacturers that employ a wide array of textile processes to make its products, including extrusion, carding, spinning, finishing, weaving, knitting, dyeing, airlaid, meltblown, and other technologies.

The collaboration builds on PrimaLoft’s “Relentlessly Responsible™” mission to elevate both performance and sustainability, through innovation. The platform includes PrimaLoft® Bio™, which was developed and launched into the market in late 2018 as an effort to battle microplastics in the ocean; PrimaLoft® P.U.R.E.™, which provides materials manufactured with greater than 50% CO2 savings; and PrimaLoft’s post-consumer recycling initiative. The next frontier for the company is non-petroleum based raw materials, including products that biodegrade and other circular economy solutions.

• Major Monforts denim customers continue to pioneer new initiatives that are pushing the boundaries of sustainable production.

Recycling their cotton waste has become one way these companies can do more with less, and at the recent Kingpins24 Flash online event, Sedef Uncu Aki, director of Orta, headquartered in Istanbul, Turkey, announced a new partnership with leading recycling operation Gama Recycle.

Traceable
“Through this local partnership we will supply the waste from our spinning mills and return around 3,000 tons of premium quality cotton back to them,” she said. “We have established a truly controlled and traceable system and partnering with a domestic recycling centre is important because a lot the carbon emissions associated with recycling usually come from transportation.”

Orta’s ZeroMax range meanwhile uses no cotton at all, being based on Lenzing’s Tencel cellulosic fibre, while the company’s involvement in denim production for a recent launch by Levi Strauss, of jeans made with organic cotton and Circulose – a breakthrough material developed by re:newcell of Sweden and partners – was hailed as a further step forward.

To make Circulose, re:newcell repurposes discarded cotton textiles, such as worn-out denim jeans, through a process akin to recycling paper. The incoming waste fabrics are broken down using water. The colour is then stripped from these materials using an eco-friendly bleach and after any synthetic fibres are removed from the mix, the slurry-like mixture is dried and the excess water is extracted, leaving behind a sheet of Circulose. This sheet is then made into viscose fibre which is combined with cotton and woven into new fabrics.

Circular Park
Omer Ahmed, CEO of Artistic Milliners also announced plans for his company’s new 70,000 square-foot Circular Park in Karachi, Pakistan, at Kingpins24 Flash.

Once complete, this will add three million square metres of additional denim capacity a month to the company’s production and take its total recycled output to a monthly five million metres.
Ahmed observed that there is currently a lack of sustainable fibres that are readily available to use for denim production at scale.

“Organic cotton is too expensive, and in my opinion always will be,” he said. “Cottonised hemp is also not cheap and it’s hard to mix with cotton, while the new regenerated cellulose fibres that are now emerging are promising, but currently in short supply. Recycled polyester is meanwhile still based on petroleum resources which we want to move away from. As a consequence, there are only a few other options for us as a manufacturer and this new project will help us minimise our own waste while significantly lowering our carbon footprint.”

Other Monforts denim customers to introduce cotton fibre recycling operations at their plants recently include AGI Denim, Bossa and Soorty.

Vertical savings
Refresh is the name of the latest collection from AGI Denim – reflecting the company’s significant reduction in water consumption.

The company has just opened new fibre spinning and denim mills at its complex in Karachi, Pakistan.

“Over the years we’ve gone through a series of backward integration steps to become fully vertical,” said AGI Denim executive director Ahmed Javed, at Kingpins24 Flash. “In our latest expansion, we revisited every step of the production processes in order to make resource savings.”

Innovations have included the installation of proprietary robotics for garment finishing, but the most attention has been paid to water savings.

“Pakistan is one of the largest cotton-producing companies in the world and we’re fortunate that the type of cotton that is grown here is well suited to denim production and also helps us lower our carbon footprint, with everything done in close proximity,” Javed said. “In the lifecycle of a pair of denim jeans, however, cotton fibre production contributes 68% of water consumption. While we cannot control how much water cotton needs for it to grow, we can rethink the way we use it in our factory.”

Refresh-branded denims are washed from 100% recycled water as a result of the company’s new wastewater treatment plant, which puts production wastewater through a series of steps beginning with equalisation, followed by aeration and concluding with sedimentation. The water travels through filtration and ultrafiltration systems before being subjected to an activated carbon system and finally a reverse osmosis system to reduce any dissolved salts.

AGI now recycles 4.4 million gallons of water each month – enough to wash a million pairs of jeans.

Sustainable
Monforts has a leading position in the field of denim finishing with its well proven Thermex continuous dyeing systems, Montex stenter dryers and other lines for resource-efficient and economical processing.

“Our denim partners are constantly setting themselves new goals in respect of sustainable production – and more importantly, achieving them,” says Hans Wroblowski, Monforts Head of Denim. “We work closely with them with the aim of constantly optimising processing parameters and achieving further savings in energy, water and raw materials throughout the dyeing and finishing stages of production.”

The latest Monforts innovation for denim is the CYD yarn dyeing system. This technology is based on the effective and established dyeing process for denim fabrics that is now being applied for yarn dyeing. The CYD system integrates new functions and processes into the weaving preparation processes to increase quality, flexibility, economic viability and productivity. A full CYD line is now available for trials at the company’s Advanced Technology Centre in Mönchengladbach, Germany.”

• "Dibella up" records its first big success

Aalten, "Dibella up" is bearing its first fruits. Since the launch of the recycling concept initiated in August 2020, six tons of sorted laundry items have already been returned to Dibella and converted into new ones by the company in farsighted reuse projects. The customer who has been involved in the project from the very beginning is Lamme Textielbeheer from Nederhorst den Berg. The Dutch textile service provider sees the initiative as an important measure for more appreciation of resources.

Dibella has taken the closed-loop approach of the textile service as a model and has taken a step towards a completely closed cycle with the "Dibella up" project. The system includes unlimited reuse and recycling of the fibre raw materials bound in the textiles. To this end, the company's own textile qualities, which are selected from laundries, are taken back and passed on to selected upcycling projects. Polyester-cotton blended fabrics are processed there into high-quality bags. Pure natural fibre textiles as well as blended fabrics with at least 50 percent cotton are chemically converted into an important raw material for cellulose fibre production, while the remaining polyester is still being thermally recycled for technical reasons.

Six tons of laundry from the Netherlands

Lamme Textielbeheer was immediately enthusiastic about the "Dibella up" initiative. The committed company has been involved in various Dibella sustainability projects for many years and recognises the future-oriented character of the new project. "Our will to cooperate was immediately clear after Dibella's managing director Ralf Hellmann presented the upcycling project, because we see it as an important measure for the prudent use of resources," reports Jan Lamme, managing director of the company of the same name. "Within a very short period of time, we therefore jointly started to take back our discarded, no longer usable old textiles. In this way, we have already been able to return six tonnes of laundry for a new product cycle. This corresponds exactly to our idea of upcycling!". "Dibella provides stable, reusable cartons for shipping," says a delighted Frank David, Lamme's Assistant Operations Manager. "This makes collection much easier for us and we don't have to take any means of transport out of our laundry".

Prepared for the mega-trend of recycling management

Dibella would like to build on the initial joint success and further expand the initiative for a closed textile cycle in the industry. "The awareness of sustainability is high in the textile rental service. But the next mega-trend is already emerging. The future lies in closed-loop recycling. With "Dibella up", we are offering our customers the opportunity to get involved now and make resources usable in the long term. We are happy about every new cooperation partner who appreciates the value of textiles as much as we do".

• Monforts customer Kipaş has been selected as the sole denim manufacturing partner in the €6.7 million European Union-funded New Cotton Project, involving the brands adidas and H&M, working in a consortium with suppliers, innovators and research institutes.

Kipaş, based in Kahramanmaraş, Turkey, is currently installing its third Monforts Montex stenter along with a third Monfortex compressive shrinkage system in a combined configuration dedicated to denim production.

This follows the successful installation and commissioning of the second Montex and Monfortex lines at the Kahramanmaraş plant in 2018, which Kipaş Vice Chairman of the Board Ahmet Öksüz said had immediately exceeded expectations.

“We performed a very thorough technical investigation based on the latest Industry 4.0 analysis before the purchase, to determine what we needed, and the Monforts technology met all our requirements,” he said, in an interview with Textilegence magazine. “The Monfortex is equipped with a variety of features not found on classical shrinkage machines and the production can be monitored from beginning to end. It also exceeded our expectations in energy cost savings.”

Kipaş subsequently received a special certificate from Monforts in recognition of its exceptional utilisation of the technology to its full potential.

The latest Montex stenter now being installed at Kipaş is a 12-chamber unit with a working width of 2 metres featuring all of the latest automation features. The Monfortex unit, also with a working width of 2 metres, is in a ‘double rubber’ configuration, comprising two compressive shrinkage units and two felt calenders in line. This allows the heat setting of elastane fibres and the residual shrinkage of the denim to be carried out simultaneously, for a significant increase in production speeds.

“Around 90-95% of denim fabric production now contains elastane fibres and the Monforts system has allowed us to simultaneously increase our production and quality in this respect,” Mr Öksüz said.

Regenerated cotton
For the next three years within the New Cotton Project, Kipaş will manufacture denim fabrics based on the cellulose-based fibres of Infinited Fiber Company of Finland, made from post-consumer textile waste that has been collected, sorted and regenerated.

The patented technology of Infinited, which is leading the consortium of 12 companies, turns cellulose-rich textile waste into fibres that look and feel like cotton.

“We are very excited and proud to lead this project which is breaking new ground when it comes to making circularity in the textile industry a reality,” said Infinited co-founder and CEO Petri Alava. “The enthusiasm and commitment with which the entire consortium has come together to work towards a cleaner, more sustainable future for fashion is truly inspiring.”

Take-back programmes
Adidas and H&M will establish take-back programmes to collect the clothing that is produced, to determine the next phase in their lifecycle. Clothing that can no longer be worn will be returned to Infinited, for regeneration into new fibres, further contributing to a circular economy in which textiles never go to waste, but instead are reused, recycled or turned into new garments.

The aim is to prove that circular, sustainable fashion can be achieved today, and to act as an inspiration and stepping stone to further, even bigger circular initiatives by the industry going forward.

The EU has identified the high potential for circularity within the textile industry, while simultaneously highlighting the urgent need for the development of technologies to produce and design sustainable and circular bio-based materials. Making sustainable products commonplace, reducing waste and leading global efforts on circularity are outlined in the European Commission’s Circular Economy Action Plan.

Fashion brands produce nearly twice as many clothes today as they did 20 years ago and demand is expected to continue growing. At the same time, the equivalent of one garbage truck of textiles is landfilled or burned every second. Most of the textile industry’s environmental problems relate to the raw materials used by the industry – cotton, fossil-based fibres such as polyester, and viscose as the most common man-made cellulosic fibre, are all associated with serious environmental concerns.

The Lenzing Group scored a total of 30.5 points (4 points more compared to last year) and received for the first time a leading dark green shirt, the highest Hot Button ranking category. Lenzing once again convinced the non-profit organization Canopy with its innovative vision with regard to circular economy and REFIBRA™ technology, its high level of transparency in wood and pulp sourcing, as well as its active contribution towards protecting forests and preserving biodiversity.

In this widely recognized ranking, Canopy grades the world’s 31 largest producers of wood-based fibers with respect to their sustainable wood and pulp sourcing, their efforts with regard to using alternative non-wood feedstock and their achievements for lasting conservation in critical forests round the globe.

Leading in sustainable sourcing with a decade-long clean record
Wood and pulp are the most important raw materials for Lenzing’s sustainable production of cellulosic fibers. The Lenzing Group is particularly proud of its decade-long clean record of sustainable wood sourcing, evidenced by its long-standing credible commitment to wood certification, which Lenzing pioneered already in the 1990s. Lenzing’s commercial wood sources are  100 percent either certified by FSC® or PEFC™, or controlled in line with FSC® standards.

Social impact and afforestation project in Albania
At the backdrop of Lenzing’s long history of clean sourcing, the company is even more aware that the global forests are seriously threatened by illegal logging and deforestation but also by the consequences of climate change. This is why Lenzing – in addition to supporting a number of Canopy’s conservation projects – has set up a social impact and afforestation project in Albania (Southern Europe).*

Special focus on sustainable plantations in Brazil
For its latest investment in a pulp mill in Brazil, Lenzing actively collaborates with Canopy to ensure that the wood sourcing is in line with sustainable practices. The plant will be among the highest productive and energy-efficient facilities in the world and will feed the 40 percent excess bioelectricity generated on site as “green energy” into the public grid.*

REFIBRA™ technology: Commercially available since 2017
As a long-standing player in the industry, Lenzing has undertaken extensive research into many different alternative non-wood cellulose sources such as annual plants, like hemp, straw, and bamboo. Until now, textile waste has turned out to be the most promising alternative feedstock for scaled commercial use.
Lenzing’s lyocell fiber produced with the breakthrough REFIBRA™ technology (Eco Cycle technology for nonwoven applications) uses textile waste as part of the feedstock and is an important step towards a circular economy.*

50 percent recycled content by 2024
It is Lenzing’s vision to make textile waste recycling a common standard process like paper recycling and to offer fibers produced with REFIBRA™ technology with up to 50 percent recycled content from post-consumer waste by 2024.

*Please read attached document for more information

• World Cotton Day on 7 October Highlights the Importance of Cotton for Development Policy

Bremen - Stemming from a 2019 initiative of the African Cotton-4 countries Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali, World Cotton Day will take place this year on 7 October. The event is organised by the Geneva-based World Trade Organisation (WTO) and is supported by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the International Trade Centre (ITC) and the International Cotton Secretariat (ICAC). The Bremen Cotton Exchange is also involved.

“Cotton is often underestimated because it is so natural. Behind it are millions of people, for example many farmers, field workers, employees in ginning factories, logistics providers and traders. We want to honour their achievements,” said the President of the Bremen Cotton Exchange, Stephanie Silber.

According to the WTO, the aim of World Cotton Day is to highlight the global economic importance of cotton and to raise awareness of the raw material by recognising the work of everyone involved in its cultivation, processing and trade. At the same time, within the framework of international cooperation, it is hoped that supporters and investors can be found to aid with technological and economic progress within the cotton value chain.

This time, the entire world cotton community will be involved in World Cotton Day on Wednesday, 7 October 2020. A wide variety of campaigns and events are taking place everywhere to draw attention to the importance of cotton and its possible uses.

Cotton is one of the most relevant agricultural raw materials in the world. Around 26 million tonnes of it are harvested annually. Approximately 150 million people in almost 80 countries around the world live from the cultivation of the natural fibre. A large number of these live in developing countries, where cotton cultivation is of particular importance as a cash crop.

Cotton is known as an agricultural product that is turned into a textile. The raw material is indispensable in fashion and clothing – and has been for thousands of years. But the use of cotton now goes far beyond textiles. For example, cosmetic products such as hand creams and hair shampoo are made from the oil of cotton seeds. The raw material is also used in the manufacture of banknotes, furniture and technical textiles, as well as in medical technology.

Against the background of the current discussion on sustainability and sustainable consumption, the role of natural fibres is becoming even more important. Cotton is biodegradable and a renewable resource. It can be grown again and again in agriculture through cultivation in crop rotation. This secures incomes and enables efficient value creation within the global production and processing chain.

The Bremen Cotton Exchange will actively support World Cotton Day with cross-media coverage. In addition, in time for World Cotton Day, three thematically different, emotionally appealing short films about cotton will be launched. They are aimed at consumers as customers of the textile and clothing trade and provide information about the benefits and properties of cotton and answer questions about its sustainability. In keeping with the times, they will be published via virtual media.