Wardrobe Surgery

A service available from recycled fashion gurus; Junky Styling. They repair, redesign, restyle and refit clothes. People can get their own outfits altered to fit or changed into something completely new: long loved favourite garments can have their life extended. It is at once bespoke, mending, creating, extending, customising,

Waste equals Food

( Cradle to Cradle, North point press. 2002. William McDonough and Michael Braungart) ‘Products can be designed from the onset so that, after their useful lives, they will provide nourishment for something new”

(see also “biological nutrients” and “technical nutrients”)

Waste Streams

(Defra) The sources of waste. there are 3: Household, commercial and industrial. Waste is recycled, recovered, or landfilled

Waste to Energy

(as) Use of methane from anaerobic composting of waste to create energy. Also waste is burned to release energy, but this releases particulates into the air. Also the possibility of mining landfill to reclaim all the buried refuse into biofuel, using new technology.

Wastewater

Micro-organisms break down contamination in waste water because they possess enzymes which allow them to use that contamination as food. In wastewater, theses microbes function successfully under controlled conditions.

Water based screen printing inks

Most screen printing companies print garments using plastisol inks, which are easy to use and last well. However, plastisol inks contain PVC and phthalates that are harmful to the environment and have been linked to various medical disorders.

Plastisol inks also require the use of harmful solvents in the cleaning process. Water-based inks do not contain PVC or phthalates and are much more environmentally friendly. Permaset Aqua inks do not contain any toxic chemicals
at all. It is formulated free from Lead and other heavy metals and complies with Oekotex Class 1. Permaset Aqua inks do not contain ozone-depleting chemicals such as CFC's and HCFC's, aromatic hydrocarbons or any volatile solvents. And you don't need solvents to clean the screens down after they've been used - you
can clean them with water. www.idressmyself.co.uk/waterbased_inks

Water consumption

Excessive water consumption in any part of production and manufacture of textiles has adverse consequences. EG the Aral sea tributary rivers were diverted for ‘White gold’ cotton production by Russia and have lost 80% volume since the 1960’s. (well dressed? and wikepedia.org) Excessive water consumption also occurs in laundering.

WEEE directive

The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive (WEEE Directive) aims to minimise the impact of electrical and electronic goods on the environment, by increasing re-use and recycle and reducing the amount of WEEE going to landfill. It seeks to achieve this by making producers responsible for financing the collection, treatment, and recovery of waste electrical equipment, and by obliging distributors to allow consumers to return their waste equipment free of charge. (<www.dti.gov.uk> 2.7.07)
Wet Extruded solvent spinning

Process by which cellulosic fibres are

created.( www.bolton.ac.uk/pdd/learningmaterials/textiles 25.3.07)

White Line

A pioneering new tanning method for leather which eliminates Chrome. (terra
Plana)

Wicking

Ability of the fibre to transfer water along its surface. (ridgewell) This is a natural quality of wool (eg felt pens) Wicking is an important technical attribute which may be employed to prevent sweat adhering to clothes and therefore
requiring excess laundering (eg wicking away sweat to evaporate).

Wool

Textile fibres of animal origin. The fur of sheep, goat, lama. It is sheered, cleaned and spun. The fibres have unidirectional scales on them which overlap and act like pine cone scales. The fibres have kinks on them. The thickness, length, kink, differ with the many different breeds of animals. The technical attributes of the fibres are many. Wicking properties can be controlled to enable complex engines in aeroplanes to be oiled evenly by the use of wool felt plugs. Pianos play as a result of complex technical engineering with wool.


Wool, environmental impacts

Parasite infection is treated by dipping the sheep in organophosphates which can cause severe nerve damage in humans or pyrethoids which are 1,000 times more toxic to aquatic life than organophosphates, but less dangerous to humans, so used more frequently. The main environmental impacts occur as a result of effluents from scouring which pollute water and land with high suspended solids content of grease.

1 kilo of wool yields an extra 1.5 kilos of waste.(KF quoting UNEP 1993 p 22)

The grease could be reclaimed for use as lanolin but is not because of prior use
of pesticides. (Fletcher, Kate.)