Nonionic surfactants: current market status and future development, properties and applications

In recent years, natural oil-based green surfactants have gradually replaced petroleum-based surfactants. The amount of natural oil-based anionic surfactants represented by AES, SAS and MES has been increasing year by year, gradually replacing petroleum-based anionic surfactants. In addition, natural alcohol-based nonionic surfactants such as APG, AEO and FMEE are developing rapidly and have become the fastest growing surfactant products in China.

Surfactants are diverse and widely used in all fields of human activities. Therefore, the production status of surfactants is also a factor to measure the level of chemical development of a country. China is a major producer of surfactants, and is currently the second largest surfactant producer after the United States. An important surfactant, nonionic surfactant, is introduced below.

Surfactants are widely used in various fields such as textiles, leather, daily chemicals, agriculture, oil fields, mining and construction because of their ability to significantly reduce the interfacial tension of materials. They are indispensable chemical additives in many industrial sectors. The amount of surfactants is small, but the effect is great. They are mainly divided into anionic, nonionic, cationic and amphoteric surfactants.

Among the above four types of surfactants, nonionic surfactants are the most important type of raw materials. Compared with anionic surfactants, nonionic surfactants have higher emulsifying ability, excellent wetting and washing functions, have certain hard water resistance, and can be used with other ionic surfactants. They are detergents and emulsifiers. An indispensable ingredient in the formulation.

Applications of nonionic surfactants

Applications in leather processing

The leather production and processing process is a complex process, including several processes such as leather pretreatment, leather tanning, leather fatliquoring, leather dyeing and finishing. The non-ionic surfactants involved in the leather pretreatment process mainly play the role of penetration and degreasing, and fatty alcohol ethers with strong penetration and emulsification ability are generally used. In the leather tanning, fatliquoring and dyeing processes, surfactants are used as indispensable components to help various major materials accomplish their process goals.

Application in coal flotation

Flotation involves the injection of air into the coal slurry. By adding a certain amount of surfactant, a hydrophobic film can be formed on the surface of the coal. Fine coal particles and air bubbles adhere to the surface of the slurry, thus scraping the high purity clean coal off the surface of the slurry. Adding non-ionic surfactants with low HLB value such as fatty alcohol polyoxyethylene ether and fatty acid ester polyether to the flotation agent for coal, and compounding with frothing agent and trapping agent, can improve the refined coal obtained by flotation. It saves time, reduces drug consumption, reduces water and increases solids concentration.


Application in textile printing and dyeing

Dyeing and finishing auxiliaries for textile printing and dyeing usually require good fabric wetting, strong solubilizing and dispersing ability for dyestuff, and a certain affinity for dyestuff or fiber. In addition, according to special needs, it can also produce a certain softness or water repellent effect on the fabric. Therefore, the wetting, synergistic, dispersing, leveling, softening and water-repelling effects of nonionic surfactants are of great significance to the textile printing and dyeing industry. Nonionic surfactants are widely used in all stages of printing and dyeing processing.


Applications in the paper industry

Nonionic surfactants can be used as pulp cooking auxiliaries to promote the penetration of the cooking solution into the pulp fiber raw materials, accelerate the removal of lignin and pectin from wood or non-wood by the cooking solution, disperse cellulose, accelerate cooking to speed up and improve the yield of pulp. Non-ionic surfactants used as pulp cooking agents include alkylphenol ethoxylates, fatty alcohol ethoxylates, etc.

With the widespread use of surfactants, there is an increasing demand for subdivision and specialization of surfactants in various fields, such as high foaming, high alkali resistance, low foaming and easy rinsing, high electrolyte resistance, high wettability, high emulsification, and in the past, surfactants were mostly classified according to the type of surfactant in academic terms. In the future, they will be classified by performance, efficacy and application areas, and the structure will be enhanced. Research on effect relationships and molecular design of process routes for research and development will be the trend of surfactants.