The textile industry is the 2nd most chemically intensive industry globally. Up to 200,000 tons of dyes are lost to effluents every year during the dyeing and finishing operations. In China, estimates say 90 % of the local groundwater is polluted and, according to the World Bank, 72 toxic chemicals in the water supply are from textile dyeing. Both the chemical production methods and the use of dyes damage the environment. The dyeing industry has a strong dependence on oil derivatives and toxic chemicals that pose a significant health hazard for workers and local communities. To convert crude oil into indigo dye it takes nine different toxic and carcinogenic chemicals, including cyanide and aniline. Aniline is a pre-cursor for indigo dyes that has been classified as Group B2 human carcinogen by US EPA. Because there is no competitive alternative to synthetic dyes: Dependence on dyes manufactured from oil derivatives makes them susceptible to price variations, supply problems, and to increased costs associated with ever stringent regulations to control pollution. The market adoption of alternatives to chemical dyes (plant pigments and natural extracts) is very low because of poor performance and unsustainability, so the problem remains unsolved.
We produce eco-friendly, high-performance textile dyes from microorganisms using waste as raw material through an efficient bio-production process. We have created a customized bioproduction solution to deliver dyes based on deep-tech computational & genomic tools to engineer bacteria. Our revolutionary & proprietary Synthetic Genomics Platform (SGP) efficiently creates robust microorganism strains with tailor-made secondary genomes that produce target chemicals (colors/dyes) with predictable industrial performance, cheaper & faster than ever before. Our SGP enables more than a 10-fold reduction in both the time and costs for strain development. Our process is totally independent of oil derivatives and toxic chemicals and our pigments have dyeing performance equal to synthetic dyes. We have invented novel methods for processing biomass so that we valorize low-cost waste and provide products at a competitive price. Our solution makes bio-production of dyes a reality for the fashion industry, a step towards becoming toxic-free and sustainable.
Our plug & play solution that requires neither process nor equipment change to the fashion industry’s supply-chain processes, offering the only bio-produced dyes that are cost-competitive with synthetic ones while they are aniline-free and environmentally friendly, in line with EU Zero Pollution Action Plan targets.
We have additionally invented novel methods for processing biomass, removing inhibitors from biomass resulting in an extremely low-cost substrate that we use for our fermentation so that we valorise low-cost biomass as feedstock and provide products at a competitive price. In this way, we can introduce new stakeholders into the value chain (e.g. brewing industries, other biomass waste generating industries), contributing to achieving the objectives of the EU Circular Economy Action Plan.
A major strategic implication for our solution is the reshoring of dye production in the EU, with creation of industrial jobs and positive impact / security for the EU textile industry supply chain.
This EU project will support the scale-up, industrialization and commercialization of our bio-based textile dyes.
