100 million used bottles recycled through Quicksilver X REPREVE® program

TW Special Report

Quiksilver, Huntington Beach, Calif., recently announced that its recycling program — in collaboration with Greensboro, N.C.-based Unifi’s REPREVE® — has just hit the 100 million-bottle mark. Since its start in 2012, about 3,500 tons of plastic has been repurposed into boardshorts, jackets and other garments.

Recycled polyester both gives a second life to used plastic and reduces the global  footprint of a product significantly. Arguably the most environmentally impactful step of a production cycle is the creation of the raw material. Producing recycled polyester consumes significantly lower amounts of energy (45 percent) and water (20 percent) than virgin polyester. Overall, the recycled fabric produces a third less greenhouse gases than conventional polyester one.

The 100 million bottles recycled through the program save close to 9 million liters of drinking water and provide the annual energy consumption of close to 1000 households. Each Quiksilver x REPREVE® boardshort contains about 10 recycled bottles.
Made from fossil fuels, plastic is a raw material that we encounter everyday. Only 10 percent of all plastic produced worldwide is currently recycled — the rest ends up in a landfill or worse, the ocean. Today, large amounts of plastic floating in the ocean are threatening both marine life and the global climate. For more information, please click here.

“We are very excited to contribute a part to the protection of something we genuinely care about — the ocean,” said Garry Wall, global general manager of Quiksilver. “As surfers and snowboarders we need to think about the future, so our grandchildren can enjoy the mountain and the wave we love so much. Up-cycling plastic waste into something that is useful for us, even today, is an important step.”

Quiksilver and fellow Boardriders Inc. brands Roxy and DC shoes have been using Repreve yarn as an essential part of their product offering for more than 5 years.

Repreve starts the process by turning used plastic bottles into plastic flake, which is then converted into Repreve chips. The chips are then melted, extruded and converted into yarn that carries the same performance qualities as conventional polyester. On average, a Quiksilver boardshort using Repreve yarn contains about 11 recycled bottles. Currently about 50 percent of the range consists of Repreve products. Over the next few years, the brand is committed to using 100-percent Repreve yarn in all boardshorts. The snow collection will follow suit, increasing the adoption of both Repreve yarn and other sustainable materials.

“Recycling is one thing, reducing another,” Wall said. “100 million bottles are a milestone, now we are working on a refined strategy to fight plastic waste through innovative products and actions. There are still many areas where we need to improve and we look forward to bringing green values into all areas of our business, a responsibility that our industry as a whole needs to assume.”

On World Surfing Day — June 16, 2018 — $10 of every Quiksilver Repreve* boardshort sold was donated to 5 Gyres, a non-profit organization empowering action against the global health crisis of plastic pollution through science, education, and adventure.

*full-price only, Quiksilver e-commerce

Posted August 16, 2018

Source: Quicksilver

The project marks one of the largest single company textile diversion programs in U.S. history where no items will go to landfills or incineration.

By Emma Kate Protis

The project marks one of the largest single company textile diversion programs in U.S. history where no items will go to landfills or incineration.

When 64,000 Delta employees in Airport Customer Service, Cargo, In-flight Service and TechOps headed to work in their new uniforms on May 29, over 1 million pieces of their old uniform were retired. To prevent those uniforms from ending up in landfills, more than 350,000 pounds of clothing have been donated to be upcycled and repurposed by Delta’s partner, Looptworks.

“The amount of textile waste generated each year in the United States has doubled over the last 20 years, and we won’t add to that number,” said Ekrem Dimbiloglu, Director – Uniforms. “By partnering with Looptworks, we found a creative way to give the old uniforms a new life.”

More than 15 million tons of used textile waste is generated each year in the United States. Once in landfills, decomposing textiles release methane, a harmful greenhouse gas. Furthermore, dyes and chemicals in the fabrics leach into the soil and both surface and groundwater, which contributes to habitat degradation.

Following the launch of the new uniform, collection boxes were placed in more than 90 cities around the Delta system. In the days ahead, Looptworks will transform any retired pieces that cannot be donated or reused through upcycling or down-cycling.

Many textile “recycling” projects resell some fabric parts while selling the rest as incineration fuel, but the Delta and Looptworks campaign takes a different approach, marking one of the largest single company textile diversion programs in U.S. history where no items will go to landfills or incineration.

“The value of this collaboration goes beyond waste diversion and the reuse of upcycled items. It also conserves a significant amount of water and eliminates carbon emissions,” said Scott Hamlin, sustainability expert and CEO of Looptworks.

Additionally, partnering with Looptworks in the collection process is Relay Resources and the Bobby Dodd Institute. Local to Portland, Relay Resources has helped with sorting, deconstruction and warehousing donations received from Delta’s western domestic stations. It creates employment opportunities for over 700 refugees, workers with disabilities, ESOL speakers or people in challenging scenarios. In the east, Bobby Dodd also supports Delta’s mission to give back to its community by employing more than 200 people with disabilities and or veterans with disadvantages in Atlanta.

Delta people can rest easy as they walk into airports, hangars and warehouses in their new uniforms knowing that their previous pieces are being put to work in the three sustainable ways:

• Donating items in good condition will give back to those in need.
• Upcycling, or taking material that is set to be destroyed and using it to create a new product, will transform the former uniform pieces into items for purchase this October like laptop bags, travel kits and passport covers.
• Down-cycling, or converting material into something of lesser value, will be used to turn leftover fabric into home insulation, punching bag contents and pet bed stuffing.

To add durability, leather from retired aircraft seats will be upcycled and woven into select products included in the Delta collection, which will be available for purchase this October. And, organizations can reach out to Looptworks in the meantime to nominate groups in need of the clothing donations.

This is not Delta’s first time upcycling uniforms. Prior to the new uniforms being released, the prototypes used for wear-testing were donated to re:loom, an Atlanta organization, where weavers designed and produced handmade products such as rugs, keychains and more.

Delta and Looptworks have revealed two signature items of the collection that will include backpacks, passport covers, other bags and accessories available in the Fall.

August 16, 2018

Source: Delta Airlines Inc.

TW Special Report

Although productivity of blowroom machinery has increased steadily in the last decades, few innovations have revolutionized the concepts of opening, cleaning and blending of the fiber. Opening of the fiber is still carried out through feed rollers and beaters, whose speed ratio can be as high as 150/1. Higher production has been achieved through higher speed of the beaters and more aggressive carding elements, often affecting the elasticity, natural resistance and length of the fiber.

Marzoli has introduced some innovations in its lines to specifically address this drawback. Stress and shortening of the fiber is caused primarily in openers by feed systems that nip the fiber and present it to fast-rotating beaters. Marzoli’s fine opener has a pre-opening roller between feed rollers and beater. The fiber is treated much more gently because the fiber is not nipped and the pre-opening roller accelerates the fiber before delivering it to the fast rotating roller.

Opening performance is guaranteed by two consecutive beaters, surrounded by four carding segments. Each carding segment is followed by a mote knife with deflector: every time the material is opened, trash and dust are discarded. Knives and deflectors are individually settable so that the best fiber selection can always be achieved with every kind of material.

In order to achieve excellent cleaning performances trash should be discarded as much as possible by the coarse trash cleaner: throughout the process, trash is broken into smaller pieces which are increasingly harder to remove. Marzoli coarse trash cleaner has two beaters with independently-settable grids and a large working width. These features entail a lower density of the throughput, a higher number of turns on the grids (8 times) and consequently a better cleaning performance.

Another crucial task of modern blow room machinery is to effectively blend the material. The automatic bale plucker traveling on the bales, with two plucking rollers and the higher number of blending chambers in the line guarantee maximum homogeneity of the tuft blend. Marzoli’s mixer B143L can have 4 or 8 blending chambers. The material within each chamber is fed to an opening roller and the resulting flocks are delivered to a blending channel where suction from the downstream machine effectively blends them.

Modern blow room machinery must minimize the formation of neps which are mainly formed by the air currents created by motor fans. Marzoli in its lines installs cage condensers instead of motor fans, which, not only minimize the formation of neps, but also dedust the material after every opening stage.

August 16, 2018