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Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - eco-soft (Industrial manufacturing of eco-innovative, safe, sustainable functionalised microencapsulated fragrances for fabric softeners)

Teaser

Summary

Fabric softeners are the most popular laundry care products after detergents. They keep clothes soft, enhance nice smells while preventing musty odours, extend the life of the clothes, reduce the formation of wrinkles and improve endurance ability of clothes against stains.
However, existing fabric softeners are usually inefficient and contain harmful / toxic ingredients that are bad for the environment and human health. In a laundry cycle, 95 % of softeners are lost in water during the draining process, generating excessive impact on the environment. The remaining 5% of softener remains on clothes for only a short time, before slowly releasing chemical substances on to skin and environment.
CARINSA will develop an eco-friendly polymeric coating that microencapsulates fragrances and drastically improves fabric softener efficiency at industrial scale. The fabric softeners produced with our technology do not contain toxic materials, increase the adherence to fabric in the washing process and will improve softener duration on clothes. ECO-SOFT projects represents a huge opportunity for our company to commercialise an innovative solution that will benefit the whole fabric softener value chain. Our solution, CARINCAP, allows fabric softeners manufacturers to increase their gross margin while final consumers will benefit from an eco-efficient, safe laundry care product that reduces cost per wash.

Work performed

The work performed during the period covered by the report is detailed below:

- Implementation of the new manufacturing facility: we have started the design of the new microencapsulation facility. The manufacturing facility will be fully-equipped with cutting-edge microencapsulation 100 L and 400 L reactors for the automatized synthesis of microcapsules. In this reporting period reactors have been customized and our microencapsulation manufacturing facility designed and partially implemented. In parallel, our laboratory will ensure full quality control requirements in order to guarantee our product performance.
- Optimisation of CARINCAP microencapsulation technology at industrial scale: microencapsulation technology has been optimised at 100 L with different marketed fragrances. The results obtained show microcapsules with the same physicochemical properties as microcapsules obtained at laboratory scale. In parallel, batch reproducibility has been ensured in order to guarantee customer quality standards in the demonstration and future commercialisation of the product developed.
- Incorporation of microcapsules in fabric softener formulations: fabric softeners formulations are complex matrixes that contain several ingredients with a specific functionality. The integration of microcapsules requires stability analysis and monitoring the microcapsulesâ€™ physical and chemical properties in the final formulation. Final formulation composition has been modified in order to guarantee product physicochemical properties and performance.
- Incorporation of microcapsules on clothes during a washing cycle. The final formulation adjustment has been validated in a real environment test. The test has been focused on the microcapsules deposition on clothes (monitored by Scanning Electron Microscopy) and olfactory clothes perception, performed by our expert perfumers.

Final results

Based on the ECO-SOFT project execution, it has been demonstrated that our CARINCAP microencapsulation technology is full-scalable and operational at 100 L scale. The implementation of the technology will disrupt the fabric softeners manufacturers and will be able to change their behaviour in the microcapsulesâ€™ incorporation in fabric softener formulation.
The market implementation of â€œeco-friendlyâ€ CARINCAP microcapsules will reduce the microplastics presence in our environment. It has been reported that microplastics pollution could impact in marine biota, resulting in bioaccumulation and introduction in the food chain. Our technology will disrupt the household fast moving consumer goods, changing the way how fabric softener manufacturers deliver fragrance in their products. In parallel we offer the first 100% green approach that will replace the traditional microcapsules approach in fabric softeners creating a market-pull along the entire fabric softeners value chain.