Denim finishing under the 2027 water targets
Brand water-intensity targets are tightening. What laundries are changing in recipe, machine loading and reuse.
The next round of brand water-intensity targets lands on laundries rather than sewing floors, and the gap between a compliant wash and a non-compliant one is often recipe housekeeping rather than new machinery.
The practical levers are familiar: shorter bath counts, higher machine loading discipline, ozone and laser replacing stone and hand sanding where the hand feel allows, and reuse of the final rinse into the first bath of the next load.
Measurement is where most programmes fail. Litres per garment only means something when it is logged per recipe and per machine, every shift, with the load weight beside it. Without that pairing, a reported improvement is usually a change in product mix.
27+ years across Sri Lanka and Bangladesh in the apparel industry.