Dyeing

Often the second stage of the fabric manufacturing process, dyeing involves the adding of colour to the knitted fabric. This is carried out by dipping, or submerging, the knitted fabric in vats of dye to give them colour. Ocean Lanka’s textile dyeing and printing facility consist of 65 machines. This allows us to dye approximately 100,000lbs of fabric each day. Large outputs, also, translate to high levels of water consumption in textile dyeing and finishing. This is a concern in and of itself but also because the main pollutant identified is, often, water that is mixed with dyes and various chemicals. As such, our management is focused on reducing the ‘Liquor Ratio’ and, thereby, the total volume of water used as well. This ratio refers to the water usage of a single machine and indicates the amount of water required per unit of dye. The older machines in our fabric dyeing and printing facility have liquor ratios of 1:15. We’ve updated our setup, however, with new machines operating at a ratio as low as 1:5. We use a considerable number of these, already, and are gradually transitioning to an operation that will solely rely on these newer machines that require a significantly less amount of water.