Non‐aqueous dyeing of cotton fibre with reactive dyes: A review

Abstract This study reviews the evolution of and recent developments in non‐aqueous reactive dyeing systems for cotton fibre. As conventional water‐based reactive dyeing causes adverse effects to the environment because of the need for huge quantities of water and chemicals, as well as generating a substantial amount of effluents, one of the alternative ways to alleviate pressure on the environment is to switch the dyeing medium from an aqueous water‐based approach to a non‐aqueous solvent‐assisted approach. Among a wide variety of non‐aqueous dyeing methods, this review focuses on several non‐aqueous dyeing systems, including dyeing textile fibres with chlorinated solvents, dyeing cotton with the use of reverse micellar systems, a dye/solvent suspension system and a non‐nucleophilic solvent‐assisted dyeing system.