Greenpeace Detox Campaign

Since 2011 Greenpeace’s Detox campaign has been working to ensure that hazardous chemicals are removed from the textiles production process. By testing samples of wastewater and textiles, Greenpeace has revealed that the textile industry releases chemical compounds that are harmful to health and environment, among them are poly- and perflourinated chemicals (PFCs) used for durable water repellents (DWR) in outdoor clothings. Both the industry and political decisionmakers urgently need to rethink the approach to the substitution of well-known and controversial hazardous chemicals such as the ionic PFCs (eg. PFOS, PFOA) and longer chained volatile PFCs (eg. 8:2 FTOH) with larger quantities of the lesser known volatile PFCs (eg. shorter chained 6:2 FTOH). Manfred Santen will sum up the Detox campaign and inform how global players, international brands are perfectly placed to eliminate the negative environmental impacts of the production, so that the clothing industry can continue to develop safer alternatives.