Archroma makes first ever textile dye from cotton plant residues

“As soon as we heard about the EarthColors technology, we wanted to explore the possibilities of cotton as a natural dye source. By-products of cotton harvesting and ginning have been utilised within the food and construction industries for decades, but we were intrigued by the idea of using cotton biomass to dye cotton fibre,” said Mary Ankeny, senior director - textile chemistry research at Cotton Incorporated, who led the project from the Cotton Incorporated side.

There is an ample supply of cotton biomass. The global volume of cotton harvesting and ginning by-products - which includes burs, stems, immature bolls, lint, sticks, and leaves - can be as much as three million tonnes per year. One 480 pound bale of cotton, for example, can produce 150-200 pounds of usable by-products. Archroma’s EarthColors application on cotton by-products marks the first time the cotton plant has been used to actually dye cotton fabrics.

Dyeing a natural fibre with dye processed with natural ingredients has appeal for many environmentally-conscious brands, a niche Archroma aimed to fill with the launch of the line in 2014.

“We are grateful to Cotton Incorporated to have brought us this challenge. Archroma strives to challenge the status quo, and our EarthColors technology demonstrates our dedication to support and inspire sustainable fashion with warm colors that can be traced from the field to the shop,” says Nuria Estape, head of textile specialties global marketing & promotion, Archroma.

Indeed, each batch of EarthColors dye offers a high level of traceability in the form of a hangtag with a Near Field Communication chip. Data on the chip, which can be accessed by Archroma customers and even consumers through a smart phone, explains the manufacturing process of the dye and where the natural materials were sourced.

Similarly, every bale of cotton grown in the US receives a bale identification tag. The tag allows cotton businesses to trace the journey of the bale as far back as the facility where the cotton was ginned. The tag also includes information on the fibre characteristics for the cotton contained in the bale, which allows for efficient inventory management by merchants and mills.