TENCEL® Scores High in New Higg MSI
Apparel brands looking to make less of an adverse impact on the environment now have access to even more material data to aid them on the path toward sustainability.
The Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC), an industry-wide group working to reduce the environmental and social impacts of products around the world, released a new and improved version of its Higg Materials Sustainability Index (Higg MSI) on Nov. 3—and TENCEL® fabric scores better than around 70 percent of textiles measured.
Originally developed by Nike, the scoring tool was adopted by the SAC in 2012, which has since updated the methodology, technology and data to create an easy-to-use public tool that measures and communicates the environmental impact of thousands of materials used in creating apparel, footwear and home textile products.
The Higg MSI’s purpose is to provide information about materials and their impacts from extraction through manufacturing in a user-friendly way, creating a benchmark and allowing design teams and supply chain partners to pick less harmful options during design and development. It uses a common language around materials for simplified communication.
“The updated Higg MSI paves the way for deeper material transparency and awareness of environmental impacts,” said Jason Kibbey, SAC’s chief executive officer. “It is a vital addition to the Higg Index, allowing us to do brand, facility and product level assessment.”
Here’s where the scores come from: Participating material and textile manufacturers submit commonly used production data via the Higg MSI Contributor. Once data is submitted, it is reviewed and verified by leading material expert Dr. Thomas Gloria, managing director of Industrial Ecology Consultants. Approved data is then assessed using life cycle assessment methodology regarding climate change, eutrophication, resource depletion of fossil fuels, water scarcity and chemistry. Results are normalized, scored to points and added to the Higg MSI. The scores are related to impacts, so, a lower score shows a better ecological performance.
TENCEL® fabric, made from the Lenzing branded fiber product of the same name (its generic name is lyocell), scores 34 on the Higg MSI. By comparison with other fiber materials combined with their default fabric production and dyeing and finishing, a hypothetic unbranded (generic) lyocell fabric receives 44, silk receives 128 and cotton gets 88. Lyocell’s score is based primarily on data Lenzing submitted to show how TENCEL® ranked versus other commonly used fibers. The score, however, does not represent any specific producer.
In terms of impact, TENCEL® fiber achieved 1.9 in water scarcity, 1.8 in eutrophication, 3.3 for fossil fuel depletion, 2.8 for global warming. Each area is evaluated equally because the SAC considers all impacts to be at the same level of importance for the MSI scores. The lower the score means less environmental impact.
“A lot of this depends on what environmental impacts are prioritized by brands,” Kibbey said, referring to the benefits of choosing TENCEL® over other fibers. “[Generic] lyocell, a mid-scoring material, currently scores much better in some impact areas than others, particularly in water scarcity.”
The new MSI index allows the user to analyze the environmental impact not only of individual fibers, but also blends. This efficient and easy to use tool provides comparison analysis among three fibers to make quantitative decisions when selecting materials.
“Lenzing is proactively contributing to several tools of the Higg Index because we are convinced that the widespread use of the index will transform the industry toward a more sustainable textile industry and transparency,” said Peter Bartsch, head of corporate sustainability at Lenzing. “We are confident that the update of the MSI will clearly show the environmental benefits of our TENCEL® fiber, thus providing more transparency to a wide range of textile experts and designers.”
To review the Higg MSI visit msi.higg.org