Fabric dyes create a rainbow of colors for our clothes, but what happens to the remaining dyes in the large volumes of water used in the manufacturing process? 

Some fabrics like cotton take in only about 75% of the dye but in general, during industrial processing up to 10-60% of the dyes are released into liquid wastewater. By law, the fabric manufacturers must clean the discharged colored water to remove these color compounds to ensure they don't go into the water systems outside of the production facility. 

Fabric companies look to ion exchange and adsorbent resins to remove the color and hardness compounds from the water, enabling the water to be reused in other industrial processes — or get safely released back into the environment. Ion exchange is a very versatile and effective tool for the treatment of dye house wastewaters.

Click here to learn more about zero liquid discharge systems in the textile dyeing industry.