Environmental and economic impact assessment of hydrophobic treatment of cotton using low-pressure-low-temperature plasma

The purpose of this paper is to compare the environmental impact, using Life Cycle Assessment, and the total cost of two hydrophobic fluorocarbon treatment methods: a novel plasma surface modification technique and a traditional pad-dry-curing treatment of fabric. These two techniques have been chosen as two alternatives, with the pad-dry curing being a traditional liquid-based treatment and the plasma treatment a novel gas-based treatment. Such a comparison is a novel effort and will provide to the relevant industrial stakeholders an indication about the sustainability and the financial viability of the plasma treatment technique in comparison to the current state-of-the-art.

The Life Cycle Inventory for both techniques has been compiled based on experiments performed at the Technical Textiles Research Centre, using lab scale equipment. The environmental impact has been assessed using the Environmental Footprint 3.0 method and is expressed in micro ecopoints (μPt). The findings have revealed that for plasma treatment (duration of 5 min using 13 cm³/min of C₂F₆), the environmental footprint is 47% lower than the conventional pad-dry-curing (8.95 μPt per 10 g of treated cotton compared to 18.9 μPt) and the total treatment cost is 81% lower (£1.03 per 10 g of treated cotton compared to £5.47 using pad-dry-curing). The most significant contributor to the environmental performance of the plasma treatment is the electricity consumption, thus a minimization of the treatment time without losing the functionality of the process, and the subsequent operating expenses, will lead to the optimal plasma treatment conditions.