A Finnish startup is building a € 400 million plant to supply textile fiber to Zara, Patagonia, for example
IMPOSSIBLE FIBER COMPANYEarlier this week, a Finnish startup developing textile fiber from clothing waste announced that it would invest approximately EUR 400 million in the construction of its first commercial-scale production plant in Kemi, Finnish Lapland.
The mill will be built in one of the buildings of the paper mill that Stora Enso will close in 2021.
Infinited Fiber on Monday said the plant is expected to operate at full capacity in 2025 and directly employ about 250 people, in addition to 50 on-site support functions such as maintenance, logistics and services. The construction and installation phase is estimated to create 120 person-years and an additional 800 jobs will be created as an indirect result of the investment.
“Kemi provides a lot of professional staff with experience in the process industry” Petri AlavaCEO of Infinited Fiber, comments To Helsingin Sanomat. “We also actively train employees in textile fiber production. We have already discussed this with the city of Kemi.
The plant has an annual production capacity of 30,000 tons of regenerated textile fiber developed by Infinita Fiber. According to the company, the amount is enough to make about 100 million T-shirts.
The material differs from recycled textile fibers in that the cellulosic fibers are broken down to the molecular level before a completely new fiber is formed.
The process begins by mechanically crushing and decomposing the textile waste used as a raw material, Alava told Helsinign Sanomat. The textile pulp is then chemically treated to form a cellulose swarm with nitrogen bound to urea.
“It makes the material soft and cotton-like. That’s why the finished fiber also has some nitrogen, ”he said.
The resulting cellulose carbamate is finally dissolved in liquid cellulose, which is wet-spun into Infinna.
The production process has been fine-tuned at two pilot plants in Espoo and Valkeakoski. Alava said it has been important for the pilot plants to be able to supply large enough amounts of fiber to enable customers to produce test collections.
Fashion giant Zara’s owner Inditex revealed it signed last month contract worth more than EUR 100 million purchase a stake in the production of a commercial-scale plant. Purchase agreements have also been signed by Bestseller, H&M Group and Patagonia.
“About 60 percent of the plant’s production in the first five years has already been sold under binding agreements,” Alava said. “There are dozens if not hundreds of buyers in the queue.”
Aleksi Teivainen – HT