University of Engineering and Technology Lahore, Faisalabad

campus
Department of textile engineering
BSc Textile Engineering

Assignment

Subject:
TEX-204 pretreatment of textile

Submitted to:
Dr. Faiza

Submitted by:
Ghazanfar Abbas 2022-TXE-04

Submitted Date: 14-december -2023

 Table of content

Abstract………………………………………………………………………………..03
Ghraphical abstract……………………………………………………………………03
Textile processing overview…………………………………………………………..04
Process flow…………………………………………………………………………..04
Water and energy consumption in textile………………………………………….....05

Water and energy conservation techniques…………………………………………..06

Recycle and reuse wastewater………………………………………………………..06

Novel sizing and desizing…………………………………………………………….07

Enzymatic scouring and bleaching……………………………………………………08

Low-temperature-activated scouring and bleaching………………………………….09

Developments in mercerizing………………………………………………………...09

Microwave-assisted pretreatments……………………………………………………10
Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………….11
References……………………………………………………………………………...11
Title:
Textile fabric pre-treatment is a crucial stage in the manufacturing process that significantly
influences the quality of the final product. Traditional pre-treatment methods may not align
with sustainable and eco-friendly practices. Consumer for products is growing, and failure
to adopt eco-friendly pre-treatment practices can impact market competitiveness. As,
aspiring textile engineers you are supposed to propose solutions for the pre-treatment
process with a focus on improving both efficiency and sustainability.

Eco-friendly:
Designed to have little or no damaging effect on the environment

Abstract

Most emerging countries' economy benefit greatly from the textile sector. Nonetheless, the sector
continues to be among the most energy-intensive and polluting. Estimates place the water used
for pre-treatment of textiles between 18 and 42% of the total water used for wet processing. To
get rid of contaminants from textile substrates, pretreatment procedures are frequently performed
at very high pH levels and temperatures. Investigating different techniques for retaining water
during dry processes requires research. The textile industry rarely conducts energy audits, despite
their importance in determining possible energy conservation and energy management
requirements. This article examines numerous methods and research projects aimed at
pretreating textiles sustainably and evaluates the potential of these technologies for bulk
production

Graphical abstract:
Wet processing of textiles requires massive amounts of water and energy and generates a large
volume of wastewater from several treatments like desizing, scouring, bleaching, mercerizing,
dyeing, printing, and finishing. In general, 1.6 × 106 Ld−1 of water is consumed for processing
8000 kg of fabric Environmental health and safety concerns motivate researchers to use green
solvents in the process In sustainability, waste generation level must be kept to the minimum
possible to reduce toxicity and adverse environmental effects The use of ultrasonic and microwave
energy, plasma-assisted processes, and several other options have been explored for sustainable
wet-processing technologies Enzymatic treatments, ozonation technology, and membrane
technology look promising. Some recent literature has shown that reusing water and chemicals
from wastewater in pretreatment for sustainable processing, either directly or with minor
treatments, can result in significant savings
Considering current concerns regarding the excessive environmental burden posed by some
industries, a thorough survey of the existing research on sustainable textile processing is necessary.
The current reviews in sustainable textile production have focused on the effect of a circular
economy on sustainable performance assessment studies on sustainability based on three bottom
lines wastewater treatment techniques, and their advantages and managerial approaches used for
incorporating sustainability). This review aims to assess conservation methods for water and
energy in textile wet processing. Further, sustainable pretreatment methods using enzymatic
process ozonation, low-temperature activated process, sonication, microwave-assisted process,
plasma, UV-irradiation techniques for desizing and combined pretreatment, and life cycle
assessment (LCA) methodology have been discussed from the viewpoint of sustainability.

Textile processing overview:

Process flow in textile processing

Textile manufacturing involves several processes and technologies, right from fibre to fabric
formation. Yarn manufacturing processes natural fibres with intermediate opening, blending,
carding, combing, drawing, and spinning. Synthetic fibres are spun using dry, wet, and melt
spinning technology from different monomers or polymers Textile substrate manufacturing
involves processes like weaving, knitting, tufting, and non-woven techniques. The textile
substrates are finally processed through wet processing to make them suitable for clothing shows
the flow chart for the textile industry's general processes.

Water and energy consumption in textile:

Seventy-two per cent of total water usage in the textile industry is for wet processing. The rest is
used for steam generation, cooling, sanitary use, firefighting, and other purposes, as indicated in .
Water usage in firefighting is around 1% of the total consumption. However, it is necessary to
store a large amount of water for an emergency to prevent fire damage. shows the water
consumption at each stage of wet processing. A large fraction (70%) of water usage in wet
processing is in intermediate washing-off operations. An intermediate washing-off process is
crucial to remove unwanted residual chemicals after each specific process. Textile machine
manufacturers continuously strive to produce more efficient machines with automatic controls.
However, many of the newly developed machines require fewer workers but consume much
more energy. Fig. 3 (A) shows the electricity consumption for various units in a
composite textile plant. Fig. 3 (B) indicates the heat consumption distribution for various sectors
in textiles. Manufacturers spend 5–17% of the total cost of the product on energy. Heat
energy consumption accounts for 80% of a textile plant's total energy consumption. Around 50%
of the heat energy is consumed in wet processing
Fig (2) Water usage for various facilities in the textile industry, (B) Water usage distribution
within wet processing.

Fig. (3) Electricity usage for various textile processing units (B) Thermal energy usage for
various processes in textile manufacturing.

Water and energy conservation techniques

The processing and production of textiles require a few measures that are not capital-intensive
but are essential from the point of view of conservation of water and energy. New technologies
being developed should incorporate water use sensors to enable more economic use of water.
There is a lot of scope for reuse and recycling of wastewater, but this could result in affecting the
quality of the fabric being processed and hence, will require remedial measures to mitigate that
risk.
Recycle and reuse wastewater
Textile wet processing generates various categories of effluents such as highly colour-
contaminated streams from dyeing and printing, medium chemical-contaminated streams from
pretreatment processes, and low contaminated streams from washing off and rinsing processes
Some research groups have focused on segregating different effluents generated from the source,
collecting low contaminated wastewater, and subsequently reusing them in scouring and
bleaching. Reusing wastewater within the system without any treatment reduced freshwater
consumption without additional cost. Interestingly, there was no loss of fabric quality.
In Europe, the European Union funded many projects like FOTOTEX, PROWATER, ADOPBIO,
BATTLE, PURIFAST, and AQUAFIT4USE in 2003–2012. Photo oxidation techniques were used
in the FOTOTEX project to remove organic compounds from textile wastewater. For water reuse,
this technique works along with a membrane filtration system. A combination of physico-chemical
pretreatment, cross-flow ultrafiltration, and ozonation to treat wastewater was demonstrated in the
PROWATER project. The operational cost to remove 62% of surfactants and 98% of colour was
estimated to be 0.78–2.37 €m−3. The ADOPBIO project was demonstrated for wastewater
recycling based on artificial neural networks and systems dynamics software. The wastewater
treatment combined UV-activated photolysis of hydrogen peroxide and the thermal-
activated oxidation process with a bio-flotation process. The BATTLE project was implemented
using BREF in a pilot plant to treat 500 m3 d-1 of wastewater and produced 374 m3 d-1 of recovered
water. The PURIFAST project combined ultrafiltration and ozonation to recycle wastewater. The
removal efficiency of COD and total suspended solids was found to be 80%, with an operational
cost of 1.25 €m−3. AQUAFIT4USE was one of the most comprehensive research projects covering
the paper, chemical, food, and textile sectors. It was meant for industrial wastewater recycling and
was funded by the European Commission. A woollen mill could save 41–69% of water by adopting
essential techniques such as using cleaner technology, monitoring product quality and quantity,
adopting the right-first-time process, processing water reuse with or without treatment as
determined, reusing RO concentrate, fixing boiler water, and optimizing water use in rinsing.
Constraints like irregular water use caused by employees' work practices need to be addressed.
Freshwater addition to processes, cleaning of equipment, and plant maintenance should be
addressed directly by the management through training and seminars to change employees'
perceptions about water usage. Reusing wastewater generated by the textile industry would be
economical and environmentally friendly and is essential to address water scarcity. Textile
businesses should promote processes like water recycling and reuse whenever possible.
Novel sizing and desizing
Conventional coating materials like natural starches and their derivatives,
carboxymethylcellulose, PVA, acrylic, and acrylate size are applied alone or in combination
depending upon the base warp yarns. The size add-on is up to 15% of the yarn's weight.
Researchers endeavoured to replace current sizing materials with soy proteins, plant proteins,
chicken feathers hemp core cellulose ether , and modified starch for better adhesion. Various
starch substitutes were synthesized by Zhang and co-workers. The elongation at break of yarn is
improved when potato starch derivatives are grafted with methacrylic acid
and potassium persulphate. Usually, 1 million tons of sizing chemicals are used per annum
globally. Starch is popular for its primary application as a low-cost sizing material for cotton.
Consumption of starch and its combinations is estimated at 70% of total sizing material, and the
rest is PVA. Research endeavours to replace existing sizing materials are tabulated in Table
1 with their scope and limitations. A study using a low-temperature yarn-reinforcing process can
completely replace sizing with considerable savings in water and energy. This method was
different from conventional sizing. Sodium hydroxide and urea solution were prepared in
distilled water at a weight ratio of 7:12:81 and cooled to −15 °C to prepare the treatment bath.
Cotton yarns were soaked in the bath for 5 min, washed in distilled water to neutral, and dried at
60 °C for 2 h. It is predicted that layers of coating might be formed from fibres through the
solidification of partially dissolved cellulose, hemicellulose, lignin, pectin, and wax. Scanning
electron microscopy (SEM) images in Fig. 4 (b) show the surface fibres on low-temperature
treated yarns being packed tightly by coating layers from solidification of the dissolved
substances when compared with untreated ones

New material Replacing Benefits Drawbacks References

material
Soy protein PVA Ability to replace PVA, Comparatively low performance, Chen et al.
easy washing, high consumption, requires (2013)
biodegradable additives, food material
Chicken Corn starch, Easy washing, low cost Requires high add-on, performance Yang and
feather PVA affected by R.H. Reddy (2013)
Hemp core PVA Shows results equivalent Poor availability Zhang et al.
cellulose ether to PVA (2016)

Enzymatic scouring and bleaching

Apart from the bioprocessing of cotton, different enzymes have also been found effective in the
pretreatment of bast fibres. Researchers produced Xylano-pectinolytic enzymes simultaneously
by an isolate Bacillus pumilus in the scouring of flax. The enzymatic pretreatment using alkalo-
thermotolerant cellulase-free xylano-pectinolytic enzymes on flax fibres reduced the amount of
scouring chemicals by 70% and bleaching chemicals by 30%. The same enzyme has been
effective for scouring and bleaching jute. According to literature, recombinant enzymes like
pectin methylesterase and pectate lyase prepared from Clostridium thermocellum were actively
applied for jute degumming. The use of the two enzymes in a mixture gives the same
performance as caustic soda treatment. Thermo-halotolerant laccases cultivated using microbial
fermentation of agro-industrial residues’ with Achromobacter xylosoxidans and Citrobacter
freundii were applied to bleach denim fabric. The bleaching effect was unsatisfactory using the
free laccase but yielded a satisfactory result with the homogenization of an oxidized mediator.
The activation of the laccase was enhanced by the oxidized activator based on 2,2-azino-bis (3-
ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid.
The enzymatic process can save water and energy in various stages. Enzyme applications
resulted in better-controlled processes that resulted in fewer by-products, lower energy
consumption, and less environmental pollution Enzymatic processing in the pretreatment of
cotton fabrics can be a viable substitute for conventional methods to save water and electricity.
However, the drawbacks of enzyme application, such as high cost, poor reproducibility, and
difficulty in getting the required fabric whiteness, affect the continuous bulk application.
Enzymes are sensitive to pH and temperature. The textile pretreatment process is carried out in
extreme pH and temperature conditions, hindering the broad application of enzymes in textile
pretreatment. Besides, enzymes have been found to act with significantly less efficiency
for lignocellulosic fibres. Thus, there is scope for further investigation to address these issues.
Low-temperature-activated scouring and bleaching
Reducing energy consumption is only possible when the bleaching process is carried out at a
comparatively lower temperature than conventional peroxide bleaching. Peracetic acid is an equilibrium
product of hydrogen peroxide and acetic acid (Equation (3)). Therefore, peracetic acid is more stable than
H2O2. Peracetic acid dissociation to produce nascent oxygen ([O]), as shown in Equation requires 30–
34 kcal mol-1 energy and is the reason for its application at a low temperature. Researchers have tried to
substitute hydrogen peroxide with peracid, which has shown good efficiency at 60–70 °C. Hydrogen
peroxide forms peracid, either reacting with amides or esters. These amide and ester-linked substances are
widely known as bleach activators. Various organic acid derivatives are used as effective bleach
activators such as N-[4-(triethylammoniomethyl)-benzoyl]-caprolactamchloride (TBCC), sodium 4-(2-
decanoyloxyethoxycarbonyloxy) benzene sulphonatepentaacetyl glucose, nonanoyloxybenzene
sulphonate and tetraacetylethylenediamine (TAED). In an activated peroxide bleaching mechanism,
hydrogen peroxide is decomposed to per hydroxyl ion (HOO−) (Equation The bleaching reaction is a two-
step process. At first, perhydrolysis reaction starts where peracid is formed by the nucleophilic reaction of
HOO− with the activators. Peracid then initiates the bleaching reaction, as given in
EquationH2O2 + CH3COOH ⇌ CH3COOOH + H2O(4)CH3COOOH→ CH3COOH + [O](5)H2O2 →
H+ + HOO−

Activated peroxide bleaching using TBCC

Process Research aim Formulation used Output and scope References
Low temperature Pilot plant 35% H2O2 (2.4 g L-1), TBCC The research reported (J. Yu et al.,
cotton bleaching investigation using (9.2 g L-1), 55 °C, 45 min saving water, steam, and 2017)
TBCC power by 60%, 38%, and
27%, respectively.
Cotton bleaching To study the effect TBCC: H2O2: alkali at a The authors have suggested Peng et al.
by pad steam of bleaching in a molar ratio of (1:1.2:1.4), an alternative approach to (2018)
method continuous process 102 ± 2 °C, up to 10 min sustainable bleaching for
textile industry.
Bleaching of To reduce yellowing 30 mmolL−1 TBCC, To avoid additional fabric Luo et al.
cotton after anti- using TBCC 33 mmolL−1 H2O2, 50 °C, strength loss of 10–12%, (2019)
wrinkle finish 40 min post-bleaching was
proposed.
Bleaching of Modelling for 30% H2O2: TBCC At a The researchers suggest a Luo et al.
citric acid- optimization of molar ratio of 1: 9.77–60.23 dose of 30 mmolL−1 at a (2020)
treated cotton TBCC concentration temperature of 60 °C for
fabric maximum effect

Developments in mercerizing
A high alkali concentration discharged from the mercerizing process results in alkaline
wastewater, toxic effluents, and harsh effluent treatment. Caustic recovery is a viable method of
preventing wastewater pollution. In a study, highly alkaline effluent was filtered from caustic
mercerization using microfiltration and ultrafiltration. The filtration process helped reduce the
high COD level. The filtered caustic solution was evaporated to collect the caustic soda for
reuse. It has been noticed from a pilot study conducted in the cotton textile industry that apart
from caustic recovery, a reduction of 24.68% COD and 13.56% effluent were achieved.
Vacuum evaporators operated with steam may result in high operational costs, but they can be
sustainable in the long run. Another study reported a 10-fold reduction in mercerization
chemicals' concentration using only 1% (0.25 N) of caustic soda. A low concentration
]mercerization in caustic soda looks promising, but the need to maintain an operating
temperature at −17 °C may not be sustainable

Longitudinal and cross-sectional microscopic view of cotton fibre (a, b) before mercerizing, (c, d) after mercerizing

Microwave-assisted pretreatments
Microwave technologies have been researched and used in the field of textiles. The upper limit
of the low-frequency range of microwaves is around 300 GHz. The heating of a polar substance
is obtained using microwaves due to dipole rotation and ionic conduction. Orientation
polarization occurs when dipoles in dielectric materials like water are reoriented under an
alternate electric field. In an alternating electric field at microwave frequency, molecules attempt
to align themselves. As a result of this phenomenon, both intermolecular friction and the back-
and-forth movement of molecules generate a large volume of heat for rapid heating. Whenever
microwave energy is applied to a material, it spreads uniformly to create heat in the entire
volume. Volumetric heating improves diffusion rate, reduces process time, and uses less energy
than conductive heating. In this way, microwave heating is different from conventional
conduction heating A conventional heating technique is associated with high
temperatures, prolonged procedures, and complex equipment, creating many environmental and
safety problems and is relatively expensive. Microwave energy is one of the emerging
technologies to process various products and materials. A microwave energy-based process
offers faster processing, lower processing cost, and ecological benefits

Conclusion:
In conclusion, the imperative shift towards sustainable and eco-friendly practices in textile fabric
pre-treatment is not only a necessity but also a strategic move in today's market. As aspiring
textile engineers, the focus must be on proposing innovative solutions that harmonize efficiency
with sustainability. Integrating technologies like enzymatic treatments, ultrasonic processes, and
natural dyeing methods can significantly reduce water consumption, energy usage, and chemical
waste in pre-treatment stages. Additionally, exploring novel bio-based and renewable resources
for functional finishes and embracing digital technologies for precise application and reduced
resource usage can enhance both the environmental and economic sustainability of textile
manufacturing. By prioritizing eco-friendly practices in pre-treatment, textile engineers can play
a pivotal role in meeting consumer demands, securing market competitiveness, and contributing
positively to a more sustainable future for the industry.

References:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959652621039020
https://chat.openai.com/c/5f903a4e-a461-4bbc-8735-47c8372be1a3