New Composites: Diversifying material sources in a circular textile economy

新型复合材料：循环纺织经济中的材料来源多样化

• 批准号: AH/Z505511/1
• 负责人: Kate Goldsworthy
• 金额: $ 12.07万
• 依托单位: University of the Arts London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2024 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FZ505511%2F1
• 关键词: New; Composites; Diversifying; material; sources

The fashion and textile industries are significant contributors to pollution, resource depletion, and climate change. To steer human activity back within the limits of the earth's carrying capacity, the way we produce, use, and dispose of textiles needs to undergo radical transformation. This work is embedded in principles of sustainability such as reducing negative social and environmental impacts at each stage of a product or material's lifecycle, alongside circularity as a leading approach to sustainability, which endeavours to circulate resources without waste. The New Composites project aims to increase the diversity of resources used in textile design as a contribution to sustainability targets while embedding recyclability in textile design.The industry currently relies in overwhelming majority on two types of fibres, cotton and polyester, which together account for 76% of all global textile production (Textile Exchange, 2021). While improvements can be made in these fibre categories by using organic or recycled input, it is imperative that a wider variety of fibres should complement their use. The current focus on such a narrow range of resources leads to a lack of resilience in the sector as current price spikes or major disruptions caused by conflict or other obstructions of trade routes have shown. The project tackles the environmental and social impacts linked to the reduced biodiversity which comes from a focus on conventional fibres.Exciting and diverse innovation is currently taking place in the sector of alternative materials, for example materials made from pre- and post-consumer recycled fibres, bio-polyesters from corn, or regenerated cellulose from agricultural waste. However, these innovations are often not fully transparent in their composition and are difficult to access at scale. Moreover, as current guidelines for circular design focus on the fibres with the highest market share, little is known about how these new fibres are best employed in products designed for recirculation.The New Composites project aims to increase understanding of the circularity potential of these new fibres to encourage fibre diversity across the industry. The challenges that it tackles are: first, the lack of information on composition, production processes and recyclability criteria for alternative materials, second, the access barriers for these materials in terms of cost and performance. The first objective is to gather and cross-reference information from material providers and recyclers so that it is accessible as guidelines for designers who intend to use these materials. This builds on existing research in this area by the project team. The second objective will be achieved by blending alternative fibres with other sustainable yet more accessible resources. The realisation of this second objective will take the form of a series of prototype textile samples in collaboration with UK-based production and design companies that shows the application of new materials in blends designed for circularity.The outcomes of the research will be a set of guidelines with associated physical demonstrators to highlight the possibilities of designing with alternative materials for circularity. The guidelines will show ways in which these materials can be combined in compatible blends which respect the criteria of existing and emerging recycling technology, and how design for disassembly can be employed when non-compatible resources are combined. It is hoped that these outcomes will enable an increased uptake of new materials and a shift away from polluting and mono-culture resources.

时尚和纺织工业是污染，资源耗竭和气候变化的重要贡献者。为了将人类的活动转移到地球承载能力的范围内，我们的生产，使用和处置纺织品的方式需要进行根本性的转变。这项工作嵌入了可持续性原则中，例如在产品或材料生命周期的每个阶段减少负面的社会和环境影响，以及循环系统，作为一种可持续性的领先方法，这努力促进无需浪费的资源传播资源。新的复合材料项目旨在提高纺织设计中使用的资源多样性，作为对可持续性目标的贡献，同时嵌入纺织品设计中的可回收性。该行业目前依靠绝大多数依靠两种类型的纤维，棉花和聚酯纤维，占所有全球纺织品生产的76％（Textile Exchange，2021年）。虽然可以使用有机或再生输入在这些纤维类别中进行改进，但必须使用多种多样的纤维来补充其使用。当前对如此狭窄的资源的关注会导致该行业缺乏韧性，因为目前的价格峰值或由冲突或其他贸易路线造成的重大破坏。该项目解决了与传统纤维的关注相关的降低生物多样性有关的环境和社会影响。当前激发和多样化的创新正在替代材料领域，例如，材料，例如由玉米，或重新生产的农产品中的玉米和重新生产的材料制成的材料，由消费前和后的回收纤维制成。但是，这些创新通常在其构图上并不完全透明，并且很难大规模访问。此外，由于当前的循环设计指南集中在市场份额最高的纤维上，因此对这些新纤维如何在设计用于再循环的产品中的最佳用途知之甚少。《新复合材料》项目旨在提高对这些新纤维的循环潜力的理解，以鼓励整个行业的纤维多样性。它要解决的挑战是：首先，缺乏有关替代材料的组成，生产过程和可回收性标准的信息，其次，这些材料的访问障碍在成本和性能方面。第一个目标是从材料提供者和回收商那里收集和交叉引用信息，以便可以作为打算使用这些材料的设计师的指南。这是基于项目团队在该领域的现有研究的基础。第二个目标将通过将替代纤维与其他可持续性且更容易获得的资源融合来实现。第二个目标的实现将与基于英国的生产和设计公司合作采用一系列原型纺织品样品的形式，这些样本显示了新材料在为循环系统设计的混合物中应用的。该研究的结果将是一套具有相关物理演示者的指南，以突出使用循环系统的替代材料来强调设计的可能性。该准则将显示这些材料可以在兼容的混合物中组合的方式，这些混合物遵守现有和新兴回收技术的标准，以及当将不兼容的资源组合在一起时如何使用拆卸设计。希望这些结果能够增加新材料的吸收，并从污染和单一文化资源中转移。