All-algae textile fibres

The textile industry accounts for nearly 10% of the global carbon dioxide emissions. Two thirds of the textile fibres are still fossil-based. The main biobased feedstock, cotton, is characterised by chemical-intensive production processes and extensive use of water and pesticides during cultivation. Moreover, c onventional textile dyeing is tremendously resource-intensive and accounts for 25% of the textile production's environmental impact.

A blue biobased feedstock with great potential is seaweed. Rather than contributing to emissions, the production involves an ecosystem benefit with carbon dioxide fixation and uptake of nutrients (counteracts eutrophication).

In the ALLGAE project, companies along the value chain: from seaweed harvesting (Nordic Seafarm and Manatee Biomaterials), textile pigment formulators (Mounid), and the textile industry (Houdini Sportswear) are collaborating with researchers at RISE and CIT to develop 100% algae-based textile fibres. This will be done by sustainably extracting crude alginate fractions from seaweed that will be further manufactured to textile fibres. In addition, the algae pigment will be incorporated in an efficient one-pot process during the fibre spinning. We hope that these innovative fibres have the potential to replace conventional fossil and biobased fibres, while eliminating the need for harmful textile dyes