An Australian biomaterials company has caught the attention of major international brands with the creation of a tree-free lyocell. Last week, ASX-listed Nanollose Limited and India’s Birla Cellulose, a leader in the production of man-made cellulose, filed a joint patent application for the production of nullarbor, a lyocell fibre that uses microbial cellulose instead of tree pulp. While cellulose is used in a huge variety of products and industries, the fashion industry in particular has long
s long been searching for a more environmentally friendly alternative.
Dr Wayne Best, executive chairman at Nanollose, said that consumers are “very aware” now that textiles come from trees, and the industry is “crying out” for another solution.
“We’ve had interest from a wide range of brands from some of the biggest global apparel companies to some quite niche ones,” Best told Inside Retail.
“We’ve also had interest from towel manufacturers, wipes and nonwoven manufacturers, and even several auto manufacturers.”
Big ambitions
Founded as a private company back in 2014, NanolIose listed publicly in October 2017 with $5 million in the bank. The company was based on the concept of applications around microbial cellulose.
While he admitted that the business had big ambitions to start out, they realised that they “couldn’t change the world overnight”. After narrowing its focus on the textile and fashion industry, the business began making strides.
“We’ve got a unique way of looking at [sustainability in fashion], which is to change the raw material altogether,” Best said.
“We first demonstrated the fibre and a piece of fabric at a convention in Vancouver in May 2018, and shortly after that we actually made a sweater. I think that’s when people started taking this seriously.”
Going green
Natural fermentation is the first stage of the production process for nullabor (Latin for tree-free), which Best likened to the production of Kombucha tea.
“It’s a fairly simple process. We take liquid waste (currently coconut water), we add a bacteria and it ferments over the period of about a week and produces microbial cellulose,” he explained.
The cellulose is then cleaned before being sent to Birla Cellulose in India where it is processed into a fibre.
“It only takes a day or two to process the fibre. Then of course, we take that fibre, turn it into a yarn and that yarn can be woven or spun depending upon what the brand wants to do with it.”
Best said the resulting product “exceeded expectations”. He described it as a soft, absorbent fibre, similar to cotton and “finer than silk”, that is 100 per cent biodegradable. An additional competitive advantage is the superior strength of the material.
“Everybody wants to go green but no one wants to compromise … not only is this tree free but it’s actually stronger than conventional lyocell made from wood pulp. So there’s a really huge benefit.”
Scaling up
Having already demonstrated that a garment can be produced from this material, and partnered with a business that can take production to the next level, the only concern for Nanollose is around cost.
“The only thing that keeps me up at night is scaling up and getting the price down. There’s a big difference going from a kilo to a tonne and then to 1000 tones and beyond, because the demand for this is huge,” Best said.
“We need to get the price down and to do that we need to get the scale up. It’s always a concern going from a small scale to a massive scale and challenges of engineering and so forth.”
The two companies are now focused on the pilot production phase to produce the first batches of fibre for commercial agreements with fashion brands.
Nanollose is already in talks with about a dozen brands that are interested in this fibre, but Best said the selection process will be competitive.
“We’ll be working very exclusively with a couple of brands, and we’ll pick those brands based on their sustainability credentials and how we think that’ll impact the marketing of the products.”