Eco-Friendly Bleaching Process in Textile Wet Processing

Eco-Friendly Bleaching Process in Textile Wet Processing

Sabbir Ahmed
B.Sc. in Textile Engineering
Textile Engineering College, Zorargonj, Chattogram

Introduction:
Textile industry uses huge amounts of resources, water, energies and perilous chemicals and thus it creates heavy pressure on the world wide resources (P. Cesar da Silva, G. Cardoso de Oliveira Neto, J.M. Ferreira Correia, H.N. Pujol Tucci). Nowadays this problem becomes a great issue for sustainable textile and also a cause of burden on the environment (A. K. Roy Choudhury). In textile wet processing huge amount of water is used. This water gets loaded with auxiliaries, chemicals and dyes. This wastewater contaminates the ecosystem if discharged untreated. The toxic effluent of chemical axillaries used throughout the wet process could severely damage the ground water and aquatic life. Nowadays it is preferable that some eco-friendly pretreatment method should be used.

What is Eco-Friendly Bleaching?
The bleaching procedure whitens textiles. Eco-friendly bleaching is a textile processing technique designed to minimize environmental impact while still achieving the desired level of fabric whiteness or brightness. Usually, this method is used on gray items to make them look white, or on textiles to get them ready to be dyed pastel colors. For contemporary textiles, bleaching is a restoration or conservation process; for antique textiles, it is a preservation phase. Oil-borne dirt, water-borne stains, and natural colorants are all eliminated during the bleaching process. It was discovered that the sun had a catalytic effect, which led to the widespread use of direct sunlight for bleaching procedures throughout history. Native acids, bases, and mineral salts were previously recognized as bleaching agents. Applying them as soaks and sours allowed for high levels of whiteness. It was normal practice to bleach linens, cottons, and woolens in the sun until the eighteenth century.

An eco-friendly agent hydrogen peroxide:
Hydrogen peroxide is an eco-friendly bleaching agent. In cleaner production advanced oxidation process plays an important role. Ozone decomposition in water creating free radicals can be enhanced by hydrogen peroxide. Ozone and hydrogen are capable to remove the dye color present in fabric.

An eco-friendly ethanol (etoh)–water (H₂O) mixture:
This is the method of initially allowing the RCFs to swell in the Et-OH H₂O mixture with 95% of ethanol by volume. By this process we can reuse Et-OH and therefore reduce effluent discharge. It is an effective method for preserving the environment is the environmentally friendly dyeing of RCFs in an EtOH–H₂O mixture without the need for scouring or bleaching pretreatments.

Eco-friendly bleaching for polyester H2O2/ Na4P2O7 liquor solution:
By using H₂O₂/ Na₄P₂O₇ liquor solution we can easily bleach PET fabric. This process is held in 10-hours bleaching of PET fabrics at 25°C in a H₂O₂/ Na4P2O7 liquor solution. This method ensures the maximum whiteness of PET fabric. The weight loss is approximately 0.07%. This can be explained through the removal of disagreeable wastes such as waxes, pectin, suits, proteins, pigments, hemicelluloses, and other impurities from the fabrics in the bleaching process.

Conclusion:
These days, the textile industry has placed a strong emphasis on the use of cutting-edge, environmentally beneficial, and pollutant-free expertise known as “green technology.” For this purpose we need some innovative bleaching process which will be eco-friendly. In this article I tried to explain some eco-friendly bleaching process which may be used for further research.

References:

1. Fattahi, F.S., 2022. A Comparative Study on the Environmental Friendly Bleaching Processes of Poly (lactic acid) Substrate: Application of Ultraviolet/O3/H2O2 System. Progress in Color, Colorants and Coatings, 15(2), pp.143-156.
2. Zahran, M.K., 2006. One-step process for desizing, scouring and bleaching of cotton fabric using a novel eco friendly bleaching agent. J. Text. Assoc, 67, pp.153-158.
3. Nei, M. and Roychoudhury, A.K., 1993. Evolutionary relationships of human populations on a global scale. Molecular biology and evolution, 10(5), pp.927-943.
4. Cesar da Silva, P., 2021. Cardoso de Oliveira Neto G., Ferreira Correia JM, Pujol Tucci HN Evaluation of economic, environmental and operational performance of the adoption of cleaner production: survey in large textile industries. J. Clean. Prod, 278, p.123855.
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6. Hamida, S.B., Srivastava, V., Sillanpää, M., Shestakova, M., Tang, W.Z. and Ladhari, N., 2017. Eco-friendly bleaching of indigo dyed garment by advanced oxidation processes. Journal of Cleaner Production, 158, pp.134-142.
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Guest Author

This article is written by a guest author and reviewed, revised and edited by Tariq Bin Mutalib, Editor in Chief, TextileFact.com.

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