In picture (From L - R) – Ishfaq A Cader, Head of Business - Dynawash; Mayanthi Wickremetilleke, Country Corporate Communications & Sustainability Lead - Unilever Sri Lanka; Shahid Sangani, CEO - Dynawash; Roshini Sangani, Director – Dynawash; Carl Cruz, Chairman - Unilever Sri Lanka; Prof. V. M. Thadhani, Senior Research Scientist SLINTEC; Gerard Irudayaraj, Director Supply Chain - Unilever Sri Lanka and Anusha Kotalawala, Factory Manager, Unilever Ceytea Instant Tea Factory, Sri Lanka.
During the recent Shilpa Sena exposition organized by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Research at the Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall (BMICH) in Colombo, Unilever Sri Lanka, together with the Sri Lanka Institute of Nanotechnology (SLINTEC) and Dynawash Limited, unveiled ‘T-hues,’ a revolutionary natural dye that would change the manner in which clothes are coloured in the garment manufacturing industry.
This initiative falls under the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan, a proprietary project with the goal of decoupling the company’s growth from its environmental impact, while increasing its positive social impact. The plan consists of three large goals that by 2020, would help improve the people’s health and well-being, reduce the company’s environmental footprint and enhance livelihoods across its value chain.
The convergence of purpose to reduce organizational carbon footprints, had resulted in the partnership of Unilever, SLINTEC and Dynawash, to explore the creation of natural dyes by the use of a by-product which is generated during Unilever Sri Lanka’s instant tea manufacturing process. Over 40 metric tons of Broken Mixed Fannings (BMF), is used on a daily basis, as a raw material at Unilever’s Ceytea Instant Tea Plant located in Agarapatana. The BMF is first filtered, waste segregated post extracting the soluble, evaporated and subsequently spray dried to obtain the base ingredient to produce tea dye in its powder form. The tea dye is then transformed into colour palettes as per customer requirements.
In light of this revolutionary initiative, Anusha Kotalawala, Factory Manager, Unilever Ceytea Instant Tea Factory, Sri Lanka, had this to say: “I am sure that this technologically advanced method to up cycle our waste product for the use as a dye, would be a stepping stone for all manufacturers to reconsider their carbon emissions in order to work in a more sustainable manner. It gives us great pleasure to know that by participating in this initiative, the carbon footprint of both our industries could be significantly reduced.”
Principal investigator of the invention, Prof. V. M. Thadhani, Senior Research Scientist, SLINTEC, voicing her thoughts said: “The concept of utilizing waste material from Unilever’s instant tea manufacturing process as a raw material for apparel dyeing, would be a sustainable alternative to the chemical dyeing used for garments. Work on the project commenced in 2016, with Prof. Gehan Amaratunga of the University of Cambridge, UK, while the intellectual property rights of the invention is owned by SLINTEC. We are pleased to see responsible organisations such as Unilever and Dynawash, leading this agenda.”
Shahid Sangani, CEO Dynawash, had this to say, “The Global Apparel Industry is currently undergoing a paradigm shift with a big push from Global Brands to make the Apparel Supply Chain Sustainable under the ZDHC initiative. We are very proud to contribute towards this effort through our collaboration with Unilever Sri Lanka and SLINTEC, in developing a Sustainable Natural Dye from Tea Waste – T Hues. In the conventional form, fabric dyeing through the use of synthetic dyes, has resulted in a total greenhouse gas emission as high as 2287g and 1855g respectively, for Acid Dying and Reactive Dying per Kg of Garment. Switching to T Hues, has reduced the CO2 equivalent by 34% and 76% respectively.”
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