Closed-Loop Recycling of Wearable Electronic Textiles

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Sustainable Engineering
• Textile Technology

Background:

• Wearable electronic textiles (e-textiles) offer advanced healthcare solutions but generate significant electronic waste (e-waste) due to complex material compositions.
• Current e-textile manufacturing and disposal methods pose environmental challenges, hindering textile recycling and contributing to landfill burden.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a sustainable closed-loop recycling process for wearable e-textiles.
• To demonstrate the repurposing of recycled e-textile materials into new functional applications.
• To mitigate the environmental impact of e-textile waste through circular economy principles.

Main Methods:

• Thermal pyrolysis of graphene-based e-textiles to produce graphene-like powders.
• Scalable pad-dry coating technique for fabricating recycled graphene-based e-textiles.
• Fabrication and testing of recycled e-textiles as wearable electrodes for ECG and temperature sensing.
• Integration of recycled materials into supercapacitors for energy storage applications.

Main Results:

• Successful conversion of e-textiles into electrically conductive graphene powders via thermal pyrolysis.
• Reproduced graphene-based e-textiles with demonstrated functionality as wearable sensors.
• Recycled textile supercapacitors exhibited excellent durability, retaining approximately 94% capacitance after 1000 cycles.
• Achieved an areal capacitance of 4.92 mF cm⁻² in recycled supercapacitors.

Conclusions:

• The developed closed-loop recycling method offers a sustainable pathway for managing e-textile waste.
• Repurposed graphene-based e-textiles show significant potential in healthcare and energy storage applications.
• This approach promotes a circular economy in the textile industry, reducing environmental impact and landfill disposal.