Acatel, an advanced vertical finishing mill headquartered in Barcelos, Portugal, has collaborated with FibreTrace® and Good Earth Cotton® to launch a collection of carbon-positive and traceable knits and fabrics made with bio-based finishing technologies.

The collaboration allows Acatel, which supplies the global fashion industry with sustainable, low-impact knitted fabrics for garment dyeing, printing, and finishing, to provide added value to its customers by combining fully traceable and carbon-positive fibers with its sustainable finishing approach.

The new Acatel collection includes two biodegradable finishing products: Eco-Print, the first compostable pigment printing system with Cradle to Cradle Platinum certification, is made from a water-based printing paste and compostable colors. The other is Good Earth Cotton® knit is finished with a bio-based finishing method that uses 85% vegetable ingredients, 92%of which are biodegradable, and has full FibreTrace® traceability.

In Australia, Good Earth Cotton is the world's first carbon-positive cotton, sequestering more carbon than it releases during its full growth lifespan.

Meanwhile, the foundation of FibreTrace technology is a proprietary luminous pigment that is placed in raw fibers (or alternatively at the yarn spinning stage) and can be traced, validated, and audited in real-time at every level of the global textile supply chain. This is accomplished through the use of a proprietary handheld Bluetooth scanner that identifies and quantifies pigments in fibers, yarns, fabrics, and finished goods, sending encrypted data into a secure blockchain and software specifically designed and engineered for the textile and apparel supply chain.