By: Seshadri Ramkumar, Texas Tech University, USA

(Greenville, SC, USA, April 17, 2012)—Regenerated and ultra clean cotton find new opportunities in the spunlace nonwovens sector.

Spunlace or hydroentangling is a major process which is used to produce nonwoven wipes these days.

Speaking to this scribe on the sidelines of the inaugural Converting and Bonding Conference organized by the Association of the Nonwoven Fabrics Industry in Greenville, SC, Ginny Casstevens, VP of Sales and Business Development-Americas, Jacob Holm Industries informed about the new opportunities for regenerated (Regen) cotton in the wipes sector.

Jacob Holm Industries with its headquarters in Switzerland is one of the worldΆs leaders in the nonwovens field and has manufacturing plants in Soultz, France and Candler, USA. Candler plant, which is 5 miles to the west of Ashville in North Carolina, USA has a 5 meter wide spunlace nonwoven line and its production capacity is 35 million square meters per month.

When cottonΆs price skyrocketed over US $2 two years back, Jacob Holm Industries worked with its partners and utilized regenerated cotton from T-shirt clippings. According to Ginny Casstevens, this could bring down the price of cotton by 50% for its use in the production of baby wipes. Candler plant uses regenerated cotton for 30% of its production capacity. Jacob Holm has perfected the spunlace process to produce 50 g/square meter baby wipes using regenerated cotton, said Casstevens.

Recycled and mechanically cleaned cotton is also finding applications in new wipe products developed by Suominen Corporation, a leader in nonwoven wipe industry.