Cleaner Technology Transfer to the Polish Textile ... - Miljøstyrelsen

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3.7 Savings and substitutions in
textile dyeing
Henrik Ellerbæk, Kemotextil, Ltd. Denmark
The Danish company Kemotextil was established in 1968 and is a medium
sized commission dyer situated in Denmark. The company has 28 employees,
18 working in a two-shift production. The land on which the company is
based, was bought from the local authorities under the conditions that the
municipality had to receive and rinse the company’s waste-water, supply fresh
water and electricity, all of course against payment.
In 1982 Kemotextil obtained an environmental approval from the Danish
authorities. The approval describes the company’s production in detail, e.g.
daily working hours, noise level inside and outside the building, the contents
of chemicals in the waste-water, emissions to air from buildings and drying
machines, and all other waste arising from the production.
In 1986 Kemotextil decided to reduce the amount of water, energy and chemicals
used in production. The consumption at this time was approx. 140,000
m 3 water per year. In the dye-house there were 36 winch dyeing machines, 4
jet and 4 beam dyeing machines. Dyeing production was about 3.5-4 tons per
day. In the following two years experiments were made with different production
processes to optimize production and at the same time reduce resource
consumption. In 1988 approx. 20 winch dyeing machines were taken out of
production, and instead production on the jet- and beam dyeing machines was
increased. Until 1990 almost all machines were replaced with new jet dyeing
machines. From 1986 to 1988 the company saved 18% electricity and 22%
water. From 1988 to 1989 another 17% electricity and 15% water relative to
the 1986 consumption. On to 1995 the winch dyeing machines were replaced
with 9 high technology jet dyeing machines from Thies in Germany. The
machines in question are Rotostream and Eco-soft jet dyeing machines and
the total savings from 1986 to 1995 are: electricity 39%, water and wastewater
60%, fuel for steam production 46%, dye-stuff and chemicals 20%,
other purchases 32%, wages 27% and other costs 16%.
To reach these results, Kemotextil changed the machine controlling system
from PLC based controllers to microprocessor-based controllers (PC computer
systems). The change was implemented to make the system more user
friendly in programming and handling. Each machine has its own Personal
Computer, which again is connected to a central computer from which the
dyeing machines are programmed and controlled.
Each recipe is put together by several modules, all in all approx. 50 different
modules, and each recipe is carried out by putting together 1, 2, 3, or 4 modules
including the adding system. The dye-stuff and chemicals are added automatically
by the computer, either liniary or logarithmically into the dyeing
machine from the adding tank.
The company’s investment in dyeing machines and equipment amounts to
approx. 2.5 millions US $. So far, the company has not made any investments
which did not recover the expenses fully within months or few years.