Management of protective clothing waste

In general, textile materials are used in apparel, home furnishing and industrial sectors. The global textile market size was valued at US $961.5 billion in 2019 and is estimated to exhibit a compound annual growth rate of 4.3% from 2020 to 2027 owing to the increased demand for apparels, especially in developing countries according to Grand view research. Waste management of these textiles is a matter of concern of all due to ecological, technological and economical issues. Zero waste management is one of the very crucial aspects of fibres and fibre containing products towards sustainability. The production process of fibres and their products are highly sophisticated and requires a huge set-up and investment. The most imperative is the requirement of energy for the production process. Lucrative waste management of these textiles lies with partial recovery of the utilized energy by means of reuse and recycling of the wastes as much as possible. Safety or protective clothing are in increasing demand in the present society. As these textiles contain hazardous materials and chemicals, their disposal needs careful attention for the environmental safety. Landfilling and incineration comes under least priority than reuse and recycling due to environmental safety issues. Some sort of physical and/or chemical alternation by means of degradation and removal of toxic substances from the post-consumer protective textile wastes is highly essential before the final disposal. This chapter provides an overview of various ways of dealing with textile wastes particularly post-consumer wastes. Special emphasis is given to various protective clothing and technical aspects of their waste management.