Sustainability and environmental costs in the textile industry: a case study

Abstract

The impact of greenhouse gas and carbon emissions on climate change and more frequent natural disasters in recent years have increased people's and government's environmental awareness. The enactment of environmental legislation and new standards have resulted in some additional environmental costs for companies. Every additional cost is very important for companies operating under intense competitive pressure. Companies operating in the textile sector undertake the costs of prevention, use and damage at every stage of their production. In this study, the importance of the textile sector in Türkiye in terms of the country's economy has been revealed and the environmental costs of textile enterprises have been examined. The study aims to reveal the environmental costs for yarn production, yarn dyeing process, weaving-confection processes and dyeing-finishing processes separately and to calculate the share of these costs in total operating expenses. According to the results of the study, it has been determined that the share of environmental costs in total expenses in the textile company is 3.1%. It has been observed that the share of environmental costs in total expenses varies between 0.5% and 6% at different production stages.