Archroma, a global leader in specialty chemicals towards sustainable solutions, and Jeanologia, world leader in sustainable and efficient technology development have collaborated to launch of ‘Pad-Ox G2 Cold’, a water-saving dyeing process at room temperature for casual looks.

Archroma initially introduced its eco-advanced Pad-Ox dyeing process for woven fabrics, and then used it as part of its Advanced Denim concept. The idea was fairly simple, yet technically revolutionary at the time. By combining the oxidation and fixation steps, it is possible to shorten the dyeing process and thus realize substantial resource savings in water, wastewater, cotton waste, and energy.

Archroma and Jeanologia have decided to team up and combine their expertise in sustainable dyeing and finishing technologies. The objective of the project was to improve the Pad-Ox dyeing process even further, in particular in one area that still offered room for positive impact: temperature and fastnesses. After several months of development, they have come up with a way to apply the Pad-Ox dyeing process at room temperature, whilst still improving fastnesses and allowing higher contrasts after washdown. A binder-free technology to obtain end articles that are softer and have greater color durability to repetitive washing and solidity against rubbing than other wash-out processes.

The new ‘Pad-Ox G2 Cold’ dyeing process works thanks to the insertion of very small machinery into the existing finishing range process, using cold processing and thus operating with much less water, carbon footprint and energy than traditional benchmark fabric finishing processes, whilst retaining the water and other resource savings offered by the Pad-Ox technology.