CALWATEX - Catalases for Low Water Textile Processes

The traditional textile wetting industry consumes about 100 litres of water to process about 1 kg of textile materials. Therefore there is a strong need for closed-loop technologies leading to a reduction in water consumption. The objectives of this project are the development of an enzymatic process enabling on-site water treatment and recycling within textile bleaching and dyeing. Catalase enzymes will be used for H2O2 degradation in bleaching liquors as an environmentally benign alternative to chemicals, which lead to unfavourable high salt concentration in the process liquors. Currently there are no processes available using immobilised catalases, which would withstand the high-temperature and high-pH conditions used during textile processing and which would enable recycling of the enzymes. In the proposed basic project the academic and the industrial partners will work closely together to study the background for a continuous process meeting all those criteria.