Eco-friendly nonwoven covers for agricultural use produced from post-consumer waste

Abstract

The global rise in population and growing demand for high-quality crops are the main challenges for agrotextiles improvement. The world needs more sustainable and eco-friendly nonwoven crop covers to replace the use of synthetic nonwoven crop covers to prevent pollution. The article considers the problem of processing textile waste from the post-consumer sector (PCW). The main directions of their use in producing nonwoven fabrics are briefly described. The use of post-consumer textile waste (PCW) based on used cotton T-shirts in the manufacture of nonwovens by wet laying process using the circular economy principle is considered. Samples of nonwovens were obtained and characterized through the mass per unit area, thickness, mass per unit volume, and linear density, and the attained results were compared with market-available ones. The thickness and linear density of obtained samples were slightly higher than the market-available samples, but the mass per unit volume was very similar to market-available ones. The coefficient of variation in the thickness of the obtained materials was about 10 %. The obtained materials can be used in the manufacture of crop covers in agriculture.