Cleaner Production in Jeans Laundries in Northeast Brazil - Implementing Environmental and Resource Management - page 83

with water of ambient temperature to obtain the required temperature. The tem-
perature depends on the specific washing process applied and ranges from 40°C to
95°C. Additionally, steam is required to dry the textiles after laundering and dur-
ing ironing of jeans. During all stages, including the steam production, energy is
lost. This is not only a financial issue, but also leads to significant environmental
impacts.

9.4.1 Steam Production

The vast majority of companies use wood in their boilers. Since control mecha-
nisms are lacking, illegal cut wood is the most attractive option. Most of the own-
ers reported paying about 25 Brazilian Real (R$) 1 or even less per m³ of firewood.
Licensed wood of better quality costs ca. 40 R$/m³. Alternative options include
natural gas, bagasse and the use of solar energy to preheat the water before enter-
ing into the boiler. Bagasse could be an especially promising alternative, as it can
be considered as a residue derived from processing sugar cane to alcohol and
sugar. In theory, one ton of bagasse could replace up to seven cubic meters of
wood (Cabral 2007). However, there are already several other applications for ba-
gasse, for instance as animal feed. Research is also being done into the production
of alcohol from bagasse. Thus, the available amount would not meet demand of all
laundries of the textile cluster.

Table 9.1. Fuel costs of a laundry in Toritama (source: Personal communication with a
laundry's owner in Toritama)

Fuel Specific Fuel Costs

(R$/piece)

Fuel costs per month
(R$)

Wood 0.0770 7700

Bagasse 0.1706 17060

Babassu 0.2367 23670

Petcoke 0.1763 17630

For one of the biggest companies, five fuel options have been analyzed ( Table
9.1 ), such as firewood, bagasse briquettes, babassu (a palm tree) and petcoke. Pet-
coke is a residual from the petroleum industry and represents the only viable fossil
fuel option, since natural gas by pipeline is still not available in the region. The
nuts of the babassu tree can be used to produce oil, which is a promising renew-
able fuel source. It is not surprising however that in the comparison of the consid-
ered fuel types, wood is the most competitive possibility. The analysis of specific
fuel costs per pair of jeans clearly shows that bagasse (0.17 R$ per pair of jeans),
considered as most attractive alternative to firewood, is more than twice as expen-

1 1 Brazilian Real is equivalent to 0.582 United States Dollar (exchange rate as of
12.11.2010, source: Yahoo! Finance)