Enzyme Scouring of Cotton Fabrics: A Review

Textile processing is a growing industry that traditionally has used a lot of water, energy and harsh chemicals. Due to the ever-growing costs for water and energy worldwide investigations are carriedout to substitute conventional chemical textile processes by environment-friendly andeconomically attractive bioprocesses using enzymes.Enzymes are used in a broad range of processes in the textileindustry: scouring, bleachclean-up, desizing, denim abrasion andpolishing. The conventional scouring process involving the harsh environment is slowly being replaced with environment-friendly approach using enzymes. Enzymes are specific and fast in actionand small amountsof enzyme often savelarge amounts of raw materials, chemicals, energy and water.This work represents a review of enzyme scouring of cotton fabrics. This enzymes remove the non cellulosic impurities present in the fabric. Such a process would enhance the absorbency of the fabric without appreciable strength loss and also would help in the proper dyeing and finishing of the fabric. The efficiency of the bioscoured cotton fabric was compared with that of the conventionally scoured fabric. The described enzymatic procedure isaccompanied by a significant lower demand of energy, water, chemicals, time andtherefore costs. So it has advantages as well in terms of ecology as in economy.