Industrial Textiles to Expand and Apply New Areas: New Hopes and New Opportunities

In recent years, the application fields of technical textiles as technical textiles have been expanding, covering almost every aspect of people’s lives, including construction engineering, filter materials, life sciences, aerospace, transportation, medical and health, safety protection, energy conservation and environmental protection, and cleanliness. Energy and so on, its development prospects are very broad.

Pulling downstream demand is the main driving force for industrial development

The emergence of many new technologies and new materials for industrial textiles is closely related to downstream demand. For example, the insulation, fire prevention, sound insulation, and energy-saving effects of building materials can be solved through the application of new materials. The use of ceramic fibers, super-cotton fibers, high-silica fibers, pre-oxidized fibers and other energy-saving insulation and fire-fighting series building materials products are moving toward industrialization and scale. Buildings built with this material have the characteristics of high temperature resistance, low thermal conductivity, good thermal insulation and energy saving. In the Urban Best Practice Area and Case Museum of the Shanghai World Expo, there are stadium buildings built with new materials. Another example is the interior materials of high-speed rail cars and cars, which require environmental protection, durability, and softness, while ultra-fine-fiber nonwovens become the first choice.

Using composite technology, two kinds of chemical fiber raw materials with different components are extruded through a spinneret through twin-screw extrusion, and then the ultra-fiber nonwovens produced by the two-in-one method of spunbonding and hydroentanglement become the current non-woven fabrics. The most advanced non-woven fabric technology in the world is not only close to natural leather, but also overcomes the shortcomings of natural leather. The microstructure of this nonwoven fabric is a hollow segmented petal type (also sea-island type, skin core type, etc.), not only strong and soft, but also a variety of physical and chemical indicators can meet the requirements of the automobile and motor vehicle manufacturers, and can even be used in aircraft. In the interior. At present, China's first hollow segmented two-component superfine-fiber spunbonded spunlace non-woven fabric production line has been set up in Ji’an City, Jiangxi Province, and has passed the appraisal of relevant authoritative departments and started industrial production. In the near future, it is hoped that this kind of microfiber material will be directly used to make garments and become one of the materials for the garment fabric. Non-woven fabrics will go hand in hand with weaving fabrics and knitted fabrics. SARS gave birth to the growth of medical protective clothing. A stream caused the consumption of masks to increase greatly. Moreover, a new type of dust-proof and anti-virus mask came into being. Green low-carbon, gave birth to the rapid development of an industry. A paper “Limiting Plastic Order” makes non-woven shopping bags popular and brings objective market opportunities to spunbond companies. It can be said that the driving of demand in the downstream industry is the driving force for industrial development. In the future, with the advancement of society and the need for a better life, the pulling effect of industrial textiles will become more apparent and pervasive.

Pay attention to the development of cutting-edge technology is a priority

From the perspective of technological innovation, large companies in the world attach importance to the application of cutting-edge technologies, often invest a lot of funds and manpower, reserve new technologies to meet new challenges, and timely adjust product mix according to market needs. These are the development strategies of these large companies. Looking at the innovative products of the international non-woven industry, many are fields that we have yet to enter. For example, a three-in-one non-woven fabric laundry piece developed by a company in Germany can remove static electricity from laundry and simplify the laundry process, which is an ideal alternative to liquid laundry (powder). At present, there is no manufacturer's development in our country. Another example is a geosynthetic material developed by a company in the Netherlands, equipped with optical fiber sensing elements and related control systems. Earth embankment reinforcement, ground displacement soil settlement and changes can be monitored and monitored in real time. This sensor-based geotextile will provide data analysis and real-time monitoring of structural engineering and geotechnical applications. The solution to geotechnical problems, such as the detection of geological disasters, will be the best solution. Unfortunately, China still does not have this technical means. Otherwise, the catastrophic mudslide disaster in Zhouqu, Gansu, may be avoided. Even if it is some of the products we have, there are still gaps compared with similar foreign products. For example, Japanese diapers are now mostly made of polypropylene filament nonwovens, which reduces the weight of the product, and the weight of some products is less than 25 grams, which greatly saves material costs. At present, disposable diapers consumed by China are second only to the United States and have become the second largest market in the world with an annual growth rate of more than 30%. However, the diaper market is still monopolized by large international companies. Most of the finished products are owned by major international brands. China still lags behind in this regard.

The “12th Five-Year Plan” for industrial textiles includes geotechnical engineering, filtration, medical treatment, agriculture, and composite materials as part of the National Medium- and Long-Term Infrastructure Project. As part of the science and technology support plan, this will surely be China’s industrial textiles. The industry's long-term development provides strong impetus. There are many things that we need to do to track international frontier technologies and develop products that meet market needs. At present, in terms of the development of new technologies, the situation is not satisfactory. Many of the projects have mostly stayed in the experimental or small-scale, pilot-scale stages, and there is still a small distance from the goal of real industrialization. Recently, the State Council has adopted seven industries, namely, energy conservation and environmental protection, new generation information technology, biology, high-end equipment manufacturing, new energy, new materials, and new energy vehicles as strategic emerging industries, and supported them in terms of policies. All seven industries involve industrial textiles and nonwovens. The industrial textile industry should seize this rare opportunity to speed up the transformation of development methods and work hard to promote China to become a world textile power at an early date.