Seaweed solutions
A source of superfood, biofuels and more, algae is touted by some as no less than the most influential organism of the twenty-first century. A thriving natural resource, but also a bane when it blooms in excess, the aquatic plant is also being tapped to make biobased dyes and fibres for the textile industry.
Divers, fashion industry veterans and entrepreneurs see in seaweed an untapped resource. An informal term that covers many different species, algae is similarly being harnessed to make a diverse array of chemicals and polymers for applications in apparel. Algaeing and Living Ink are developing dyes and inks, whereas Keel Labs and Phycolabs are making fibres from kelp.
All too aware of the detrimental impact of the apparel industry on the environment, Renana Krebs quit her job as a fashion designer to develop cleaner solutions for the sector, starting with fashion’s primary components. “Fibre and colour are the essence of everything in fashion,” she tells Sportstextiles. Since 2016, she has been working on developing dyes and a cellulosic fibre from algae.
The company’s Algadyes and Algainks are now available in a palette of nearly 20 hues, which she says are “toxic-free colourants and a drop-in solution in conventional machines”. The company releases new shades on a seasonal basis and can also make custom colours for customers. This was the case with Organic Basics, which launched a first commercial range of products using the company’s dyes last year. “Algadyes have the same performance as conventional colourants with regards to washing, rubbing, sweating and UV resistance,” says the co-founder and CEO of Algaeing, who is based in Berlin. They require no binders and few chemicals, and more importantly, they are cost-competitive. “We can produce 150 tonnes per month. If we scale further, prices will go down,” she says. Each colour is delivered from algae at different stages of harvesting. “As it grows, it goes from green to brown to purple,” she says. The colour of the algae thus produces the tint. “Basically we ‘unlock’ algae to form a chemical bond between the colour and the fibre.”
Algaeing has formed a partnership with manmade cellulosic fibre producer Birla Cellulose, based in India, to develop a yarn integrating cellulose from algae. Ms Krebs says that it will be produced already tinted, thus offering a dyeless, algae-based cellulosic fibre.
Supply chain integration
To ensure that any brand seeking to use Algadyes can find a supplier capable of applying it efficiently, Ms Krebs has set up a network of partner dyeing facilities around the world. “When a brand contacts us, there is a good chance that we already have a partnership with a dyer in its supply chain,” she says. This makes adoption of the algae-based colourants risk-free for brands and should reduce barriers to adoption.
Living Ink, based in Colorado, transforms algae farming waste into a biomass-based carbon black alternative. Founded in 2013, the company has made good progress in rolling out a soybean ink alternative for printers, applying the inks on paper or textiles. Major brands including Patagonia, Nike and New Balance have adopted Living Ink’s algae ink for hangtags and packaging. “We've shown that the product works, that we can scale and ship across the world. We are no longer a small start-up with a small vial of material. Our inks are being used by the biggest factories in the world,” says Scott Fulbright, Living Ink’s co-founder and CEO, who notes that New Balance has printed 83 million hangtags with the company’s black ink.
However, price and supply chain inertia have limited the algae-tech company’s growth. “One of our challenges is that factory partners have no incentive to work with us,” he tells Sportstextiles. This is why he intends to “play outside the lines of the industry” in 2025. “We are small enough that we can take some risks, and that includes education and transparency.” Brands have little insight into what dyes or pigments are used to make their products, and even less knowledge of the quantities involved. Living Ink believes that bringing light to this industry blind spot may unlock sales.
Securing offtake is another issue that Living Ink, like Algaeing and most textile innovation start-ups, faces. “In the next two years, we need to obtain solid commitments from brands. This will enable us to build a larger production facility, and it will help drive prices down further,” says Mr Fulbright. He believes packaging is as an easier market to enter, as “the sales cycle is shorter, and it is easier to plug in a new ingredient”.
Living Ink has plans to build a pilot plant, possibly in Vietnam, to supply the country’s many footwear manufacturers. “We’ve pivoted to make smaller production units that require lower capital investment,” he says. “Depending on market demand, we can build units of various sizes capable of treating from 180 to 5,000 tonnes of biomass.” This, he adds, is small for a chemicals company, and small, too, in a carbon black industry valued at $36 billion.
Seaweed in the wild
Living Ink is also investigating other sources of biomass, and specifically waste from the brewing industry. “Having access to different forms of biomass derisks our business,” says Mr Fulbright. The company is also investigating harvesting macro algae in the ocean. “It makes for a great sustainability story. It doesn’t require a manmade facility, nor manmade nutrients to feed algae,” he tells Sportstextiles.
Finland-based Origin by Ocean was created specifically to address invasive algae blooms. Mari Granström, a diver and a PhD in organic chemistry, founded the company to solve two problems: to produce more sustainable and non fossil-fuel based chemicals and to support communities affected by algae blooms. The company established in 2019 has patented a biorefining process that can extract valuable compounds from all species of brown algae, says Noora Westerlund, communication director for Origin by Ocean. It has identified five different compounds that can be extracted from sargassum and has already launched sodium alginate and fucoidan, which it says can replace oil-based chemicals in textiles, food, cosmetics and detergents. The production process is said to be ecological, using water-based solvents without harmful chemicals. Ms Westerlund says there are millions of tonnes of unutilised algae biomass that are left to rot and emit methane in the process. “Current farmed algae production does not meet demand,” she says, adding that solutions for algae produced in nature are urgently needed.
Last year, Origin by Ocean finalised its pilot phase and expects to launch small-scale production in Otaniemi, in the south of Finland, which could be ready for commercial production during 2025. The company has raised €7.5 million in seed funding and is now securing €17.5 million for a commercial outsourced manufacturing facility planned to be in operation in 2026. Further afield, by 2030, it intends to build a large-scale biorefinery in the Caribbean.
The company’s first concrete textile project involved Finnish fashion brand Marimekko that printed its iconic Unikko patterns using Origin by Ocean’s alginate-based paste in its printing facility in Helsinki. “In the project, a synthetic thickener was replaced with our algae-based thickener in the print paste,” says Ms Westerlund. The challenge in growing its business is that most brands don’t own their manufacturing facilities, she points out. “We are now negotiating offtake agreements so that we can build a price-competitive production facility.”
Seaweed-based fibres
Other companies are developing seaweed- based fibres. A project that originated with students at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York and originally called Algiknit, Keel Labs now has a few concrete projects under its belt. Its Kelsun seaweed-based fibre has been used by Stella McCartney and was featured in a limited run of shirts by Outerknown, a brand founded by surf legend Kelly Slater. The company, which is now based in Morrisville, North Carolina, has made real progress since 2019 when it filed a patent for “an alginate-based fibre made of a composition comprising an alginate, a cellulose and a polyol plasticiser, such as glycerol”. These entirely plant-based components are said to endow the fibre with the strength and stability needed for industrial textile applications.
The patent indicates that the fibre may be an acetate yarn, or some other form of manmade cellulosic fibre. Whatever its make-up, it is said to have better mechanical properties than conventional alginate fibres, which can be brittle in an unhydrated state, as specified in the patent filing. The document also indicates that the fibre’s alginate content is less than 10%. The fabric used by Outerknown was composed of 70% regenerative organic cotton and 30% Kelsun. It is expected that Keel Labs, like other next-gen fibre companies, will now seek to expand beyond capsule collections to achieve full scale production.
In Brazil, PhycoLabs is also working on creating a fibre from seaweed. It is based in São Paulo. Founder and CEO, Thamires Pontes, says the company’s technology “leverages the unique properties of marine algae, highlighting its high nutrient content, renewability and versatility”. The company sources its seaweed from aquaculture farms or coastal plantations in Brazil that prioritise sustainable, responsible cultivation practices. “Our process avoids ‘heavy’ chemistry while drawing on synthetic fibre production. The fibre can resemble synthetic materials, and when burned, it emits a smell similar to that of natural fibres. Unlike synthetics, it is designed to prevent microplastic release during washing and aims to be biodegradable and recyclable. We’re refining the formulation to meet industrial-scale production demands,” she tells Sportstextiles.
Phycolabs is currently in pre-commercialisation phase and has its eyes on a possible industrial production launch in 2026. “We have successfully created functional prototypes and are actively engaging with key partners in the textile and fashion sectors. Our next steps include scaling up production and refining our fibre to meet the demands of large-scale manufacturing,” she says.
A good story
Seaweed is presented as a natural resource that doesn’t use land, captures carbon dioxide through photosynthesis, and appears to be thriving, but is it an easy sell? For Renana Krebs at Algaeing, it is a good story. In addition to its sustainable and non-toxic nature, she notes that it can convey a skin wellness message.
People love the algae story, agrees Scott Fulbright at Living Ink. But his goal is now to propose a menu of biomass sources, at different price points and having different sustainability scores. “A brand can choose the biomass that suits it best, for marketing or sustainability purposes. If algae is its story, then algae it will be,” he says.
“We make high value products that are easy to sell,” says Noora Westerlund at Origin by Ocean. “But algae’s full potential is not easy to understand, and not all renewable resources are sustainable.” She notes that kelp farming for food is not necessarily done in a sustainable manner. “If demand for algae-based ingredients rises, companies may be tempted to develop harsher production methods and farming that is extractive.”
What may at first sight seem to be a perfect source of green chemistry and materials could be just another instance of greenwashing. In its various forms, seaweed has proved that it can be a tiny part of a product, the ink on a hangtag or a few strands of cellulose in a yarn; it has yet to prove that it can make a bigger splash in our wardrobes.
The first commercial range of products to feature Algaeing dyes was launched last year by Organic Basics, a Danish brand that is now owned by Delta Galil.
CREDIT: Organic Basics
