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Towards Sustainable Textiles for a Safer Planet: Main Topics
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This review critically examines sustainability claims in the textile industry, arguing that despite advances in fiber development and recycling, true sustainability requires addressing microplastic shedding, energy use, and resource depletion throughout the full textile lifecycle. The authors distinguish between genuine sustainability and greenwashing.
The textile branch traditionally uses a surplus of energy, consuming an enormous amount of water, and is responsible for the deterioration of the environment. New solutions are formally focused on a circular economy with an impetus on sustainable development and a world with zero waste. In reality, the aims of circular economy often do not coincide with sustainability issues, and sustainability is, in fact, narrowed to nature-created products (especially fibers) and not renewable resources. The main aims of this article are to critically discuss sustainability aspects of fiber development, textile design, production, use, and recycling or waste treatment. It is demonstrated that despite improvements in sustainability, comprehensive solutions need focused action of specialists from different disciplines with the same target, i.e., real sustainability for a future world. New machinery for the production of textiles without limitations to their thickness is one typical example of the approach to better sustainability. One of the key issues is the selection of sustainable fibers for future textile applications. The benefits and problems of replacing synthetic fibers with natural ones are discussed in detail. The recent techniques of textile waste treatment are presented, and problems with microplastics releasing from textiles are shown.
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