
CFB – Recycled Cotton is the best option?
Cotton is one of the most popular and comfortable fibers. It has been used in around 56% of textile fiber applications worldwide.
Cotton is recycled from post-industrial and post-consumer cotton products and waste. Recycled Cotton fiber is made with 100% recycled Cotton fiber.
It is suitable for overdyeing, using minimal solvents and water.
What is Recycled Cotton?
Recycled Cotton is defined as converting used cotton fabric into cotton fiber. The fiber can be recycled and reused in the textile manufacturing process and new apparel products.
Recycled Cotton is popular as regenerated Cotton, reclaimed Cotton, RCF, shoddy, etc. Recycled textile material includes recycled reconditioned and re-manufactured components, raw material, and fabric.
Annual textile waste is estimated at around 25 billion pounds. CFBcotton could exceptionally reduce textile waste.
Though Recycled Cotton is an old concept in the textile industry, textile manufacturers are unaware of this recycled Cotton fiber.
But today, continuing to evaluate its supply chain footprint, the interest has grown.
The Source of Cotton recycling is:
Usually, sources of cotton recycling are two types. These are:
a) Pre-consumer: Scraps produced in yarn production, fabric production, cutting room, production line by-products.
b) Post-consumer: Apparel, garments, household items to be repurposed
Pre-consumer cotton waste comes from any excess material from yarn, fabrics, and apparel production. Post-consumer waste comes from discarded apparel.
In sustainability, recycling Cotton is a hot topic with the high interest of manufacturers, brands, retailers, and the consumer.
It’s played an important role in fulfilling the objective of sustainability in the textile industry to reduce waste management.
How is recycled Cotton made?
At first, Recycled material is gathered from industry or consumer waste. Then they are separated by variation of color, stripe, material.
After sorting, it’s shredded by a cutting machine and turned into smaller pieces of fabric. And further into crude fiber and can be re-spun back into yarn for reuse. It will give a new life as another product.
The process of shedding fabric is done by a cruder. It increases the quality of the new raw fiber. But shorter fiber creates harder to spin.
Therefore, the recycled fibers are blended with other raw materials, such as regular Cotton, to improve strength and make them suitable for recycling.
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How much water can we save by using CFBcotton?
Regular cotton harvesting involves the huge application of large-scale pesticides and fertilizers. These cause harm to the whole environment.
Besides, regular cotton harvesting and processing need a huge amount of water.
Recycled Cotton has been led to a significant saving of natural resources, including water.
The real power in CFBcotton materials is saving water, reducing wastewater.
- A ton of recycled Cotton can save 765-800 cubic meters of water.
- A Kilogram of CFBcotton can save 20k litters of water.
How much do we save on clothes that will pay to the trash?
Roughly 13-15 million tons of clothing have been thrown into the trash. It’s almost 85-90% of the total consumption of apparel all over the USA.
Most of them are thrown away, filled into the landfill or burned. Every American, roughly 37kg of clothes pay to the trash.
If we count about the globe, that’s insane. About 90-100 million tons of textile waste are created from the consumer perspective.
By 2030, 134 million tons of textile products will be thrown into the waste per year.
Meanwhile, the consumer is buying more clothes than ever.
Today the average consumer now buys 60% more clothing than did 15 yrs ago. More than 2 tonnes of clothing are bought per minute in the UK only.
Around 56 million tonnes of clothing are bought every year worldwide. It is expected to be 93 million tonnes by 2030 and 160 million tonnes by 2050.
Therefore, the Textile industry is responsible for 12-15% of all greenhouse gas emissions. Only textile production releases around 1.2 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere per year.
But today, time is changing. Most consumers believe that sustainability is equal to recycling.
- 24% of consumers are willing to pay extra for home textile materials leveled as recycled.
- 32% of consumers willing to pay extra for clothing
When We Save On Dye Chemistry:
In recycled Cotton, energy, water, dyestuff, and other chemical use are reduced to produce recycled fiber.
Though recycled Cotton is sourced from post-consumer textiles sorted by color, it has already been colored.
Consequently, producing new recycled fiber doesn’t need additional color or dyestuff.
So there, a huge amount of dye and chemicals can save by practicing more on the production of recycled Cotton.
It will directly affect on textile industry to reduce environmental pollution.
CFBcotton prevents spare wastages. It is a more sustainable alternative to disposal. RCF has come from clothing or textile waste or leftovers.
They are eventually spun into new fiber and yarns and then fabric.
Benefits:
The main benefits of recycled Cotton have great potential to reduce water and energy consumption in the textile industry.
The amount of water needed is less than the amount used to grow and generate raw Cotton.
Key Benefits of Recycled Cotton
- Reduce the emission of CO2 and other fossil fuels.
- High-quality recycled fiber.
- It helps to reduce the textile wastage problem.
- Prevent unwanted wastage that can divert many products from landfills
- Sustainable and circular production in Textile Industry
When industry and consumers choose recycled Cotton fabric-made apparel, it can reduce the side effects of cotton farming on the environment.
It will be easy to prevent textile waste from being disposed of in landfills or incinerated.
Recycled Cotton enhances the circularity to become a reality in the textile industry.
A huge amount of recycled Cotton sources is generated through pre-consumer waste.
Such as cutting scraps. Post-consumer waste is more difficult to sort through.
Due to various color shades, fabric blends, it’s a very labor-intensive process. For the entire textile supply chain, RCF has played a vital role in fulfilling sustainability.
Final Word
CFBCotton emphasizes circularity and the limited use of traditional raw materials, which is harmful to the environment.
CFBcotton represents the textile industry has been moving away from a linear economy to a circular economy where the raw materials used to produce the textile products are recycled for as long as possible.
Sofia Lobo
Production assistant at CFB
