Apparel adopts new tech to go green
Gas heat recovery is just about the name of the overall game for efficiency in the textile and garment industry to stay competitive running a business and for a green transformation to save lots of the environment and another generation.
Most the big spinning, dyeing, washing and weaving mills have adopted new heat recovery technologies to utilise waste heat energy from gas burners installed to perform the factories.
Previously, the burner exhausts used to be released in the air however now the millers capture it to boil water and run air-con and other purposes that they are able to save both money and energy.
The waste heat recovery system offers textile industries an financial and green solution to save lots of valuable energy.
The system extracts and reuses waste energy from professional processes rather than dissipating it in to the environment, according to the Partnership for Cleaner Textile (PaCT), a programme led by International Finance Corporation (IFC).
Launched in 2013, the PaCT targets reducing environmentally friendly impact and resource consumption of Bangladesh's textile sector.
The PaCT said a lot more than 338 factories are employing the waste heat recovery systems and gas consumption has annually reduced by 1.26 % to 12,74,983 cubic metres from 12,91,122 cubic metres.
Industry operators said the recovered heat can be used for onsite power and steam generation and preheat combustion air.
"Through the use of exhaust gas boilers, we have reduced gas consumption and increased engine's efficiency and total annual savings of $1.04 million," said MA Jabbar, managing director of DBL Group, a leading textile and garment group.
The DBL's 90 MW natural gas engine's current efficiency is 56 per cent and it is focusing on the heat recovery to improve it to 61 %.
"I regularly review our energy efficiency level on a monthly basis for further improvement to save the environment and also continuation of production," said Jabbar, adding that he plans on solar technology accounting for 10 % of the group's power consumption by 2025.
Among the processes involve converting the exhaust fuel into steam which is fed into a turbine to produce electricity, said A Matin Chowdhury, managing director of Malek Spinning Mills.
However, these steam turbines can only just convert 35 % of the steam into electricity, he said.
Wherever the industry uses captive power units, steam could be additionally generated for various other uses, such as for example for chillers, dyeing and availing warm water, which could have otherwise required consuming additional gas, he said.
The overall gas consumption in such industries attains efficiencies of 81 % to 86 %. Where combined cycle power plants are run, the efficiency is higher, at 47 % to 52 %, Chowdhuy said.
Chowdhury said he has been making savings capturing waste heat energy from gas consumption in his three units including Knit Asia, Salek Textile and JM Fabrics at Shafipur in Gazipur.
He produces 50 tonnes of fabrics a day to create garment items at Knit Asia.
Md Anarul Islam Sarker, deputy general manager for utility and maintenance at Fakir Apparels, operates four natural gas-fired generators to perform facilities.
The generators emit large volumes of exhaust gases at high temperatures, that your company is utilising to run boilers and produce steam for garment ironing, dyeing and finishing units.
The waste heat recovery system has substantially reduced the business's energy and boiler fuel demand by 27,456 kWh/year and 2,595,840 m3/year, respectively.
The factory is said to be enjoying $208,615 in annual savings from waste heat recovery, which it invested $177,000, Sarker said.
