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Courtesy of Guilford of Maine

What&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s new in the acoustic fabric market.

With so many uses, it&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s not surprising both main sectors of the acoustic market are currently growing.

Researchers estimate the will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 7.2% between 2021 to 2030. And the global is expected to hit $3.5 billion by 2027.

What&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s causing such an increase in the overall acoustic fabric market?  Focusing on aesthetics, combining different fibers and technologies, and getting creative with sustainability, as well as gearing up for customers&/aatccnews_09a/8217; future needs.

Focus On Aesthetics

Courtesy of Alkegen

Specialty materials manufacturer expressly created their line of acoustic felt for architectural interior designers as they saw a need in that market, says Alex Alexis, business development in North America for Alkegen&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s Construction and Advanced Materials Division.

Instead of the gray color traditional acoustic felt panels had, Alkegen offers a wide variety of colors for its 100% PET needlepunched acoustic felt.

“It&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s kind of a never-ending story, where we need to reinvent ourselves in order to create new designs, new faces, new looks,” Alexis says. “We have a collection where we&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re providing specific models, but at the same time, we&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re capable of making custom products re-adapted to the customer. So, we&/aatccnews_09a/8217;ll be making logos, we&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re going to be making some new graphics. We have to be very creative in order to get the eyes of the customers.”

Additionally, Alexis says, Alkegen is working on transforming their nonwoven acoustic felt into 3D products, which would allow them to not just provide the felt itself, but rather the entire finished acoustic panel. “We&/aatccnews_09a/8217;ll be making some baffles that are intended for ceiling applications,” he details. “We&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re going to be making some acoustical wall tiles to be installed directly on the walls.”

And Alexis says they are working on new acoustic felt products that not only provide sound absorption, but also add an aesthetic element. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;For example, we&/aatccnews_09a/8217;ve been making some hanging screens where it&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s really intended to not only have better aesthetics, but they will also be used to be absorbent and help noise pollution,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he adds.

Courtesy of Alkegen

Creating Combinations

Behnam Pourdeyhimi, professor of textiles in the , and director of the , says one of the most interesting developments in the way acoustic fabrics are being made is by using combinations of fiber sizes and technologies.

For example, an acoustic fabric could be made using meltblown technology and a mixture of big and little fibers. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;The big fibers give you compression, resilience, and resistance, and the fine fibers help with the acoustics,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he adds.

Additionally, Pourdeyhimi says this manufacturing method could be used to ultimately create 3D corrugate-type structures. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;Those are really amazing because they&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re fast, they&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re fairly inexpensive to produce, and they give you some really good properties,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he says.

Pourdeyhimi says a key area for these types of acoustic fabrics is the automotive market, as you want low-weight products. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;A lot of these things are made from materials like polypropylene that have very low density, but also the structures are very lightweight, fairly high porosity, (and) low salinity,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he explains. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;That allows you to create these very unique types of structures where you can&/aatccnews_09a/8217;t really ever do that in other kinds of systems.&/aatccnews_09a/8221;

Getting Creative With Sustainability

Courtesy of Guilford of Maine

Over at acoustic fabric producer , many of their acoustic fabrics use pre-consumer or post-consumer recycled polyester. Using this recycled content, says Territory Manager Shawn Voss, speaks to the company&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s passion for sustainability.

&/aatccnews_09a/8220;The most common source of recycled polyester material is typically from recycled water bottles, and so it&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s giving you a good source of recycled content (and) creating a useful product out of something that otherwise would have been thrown away,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he explains.

However, Voss says Guilford of Maine is going one step closer by launching its sub-brand . &/aatccnews_09a/8220;We have partnered with a company called ,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he continues. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;They work with NGOs and fishermen throughout the world. &/aatccnews_09a/8230; If the fisherman is pulling up their net from the ocean and it&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s a whole bunch of garbage and plastic that doesn&/aatccnews_09a/8217;t biodegrade &/aatccnews_09a/8230; it&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s waste, there&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s no value to it. This company will buy that plastic waste. It will get cleaned, sorted, separated, and then it can be upcycled and turned into yarn, and then we will leave with that yarn.&/aatccnews_09a/8221;

Through this partnership, Voss says they now offer an acoustic fabric called Marin. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;For every yard of fabric, up to half of that can be made from upcycled ocean waste,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he adds.

Future Sounds

Courtesy of Guilford of Maine

When asked where he believes the acoustic fabric market is going in the future, Alexis says it will continue to grow as populations increase and the construction industry is not as focused on building one-family homes. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;We&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re talking about multi-family houses or multi-dwelling buildings where the population is a little bit more densified,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he continues. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;Because of that, suddenly the noise becomes a pollution.&/aatccnews_09a/8221;

When it comes to the automotive acoustic fabric sector, Pourdeyhimi says textile manufacturers will be facing new challenges as electric vehicles become more popular. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;You&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re going to have a lot of road noise, so that&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s going to put another really challenging opportunity in the nonwovens industry to create even better sound insulation materials,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he details. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;I actually drove an electric vehicle recently and I was amazed at how pronounced the sound was. So, I think that&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s definitely an interesting thing that&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s been happening and there are a lot of people working on really good solutions for that.&/aatccnews_09a/8221;

And Voss believes sustainability will continue to be a focus with creative ways to source materials and the development of new technologies. For example, Guilford of Maine has developed a biodegradable polyester through its Clean Impact Textiles sub-brand, he says.

&/aatccnews_09a/8220;The way that works is when we&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re extruding the yarn or creating the fiber, we&/aatccnews_09a/8217;re adding a biocatalyst into that process,&/aatccnews_09a/8221; he explains. &/aatccnews_09a/8220;There&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s certain microorganisms that live in landfills that digest and break down the garbage. It&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s not that they don&/aatccnews_09a/8217;t break down plastic — eventually plastic will biodegrade, but it takes a really long time because it&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s not appetizing to those microorganisms. Adding the biocatalyst in there makes it more attractive to those microorganisms that specialize and live in that landfill environment. We&/aatccnews_09a/8217;ve had it independently tested and in about three and-a-half years it will biodegrade.&/aatccnews_09a/8221;

As acoustic fabric manufacturers steadily march into the future, there&/aatccnews_09a/8217;s no denying there is still much to come in this fast-growing and fast-evolving marketplace.

��ɫֱ�� the Author

Corrie Pelc has more than 23 years of writing and editing experience as a magazine journalist, freelance writer, and blogger. Find her on .