Current situation and development of plastic addit

Current situation and development of plastic additives in the world

Plastic Additives (additives) are indispensable and important raw materials in plastic products. Their main categories include: plasticizers, heat/light stabilizers, antioxidants, antistatic agents, lubricants, flame retardants, impact modifiers, foaming agents, antibacterial agents, nucleating/transparency agents, etc. Plastic additives can not only improve the process performance, processing conditions and processing efficiency of polymers in the processing process, but also improve the product performance, improve the use value and prolong the service life of products. Plastic additives must complement, promote and develop with the development of plastic industry

in recent years, in order to improve economic efficiency, give full play to the advantages of economies of scale, reduce costs and enhance competitiveness, large multinational chemical companies have formed a trend of mutual mergers, cooperation and reorganization. In order to adapt to this development trend, improve its competitiveness, constantly adjust the product structure, adjust the combination, and form a large-scale, global multinational company, and the production and supply of plastic additives will become more and more centralized and globalized. Some multinational companies have formed their own business scope in some fields of plastic additives, giving full play to their respective advantages, and constantly expanding the market coverage of global sales

according to the report of "plastic additive VI" completed by Townsend polymer consulting company (TPSI) in August 2005, the plastic additive industry has begun to recover and strengthen after several difficult years. In 2004, the global demand for plastic additives was 9900kt, and the sales volume reached 19billion US dollars, of which North America accounted for 25%, Europe for 25%, China for 16%, Asia Pacific region for 24%, and other regions for 10%. It is predicted that the world demand for plastic additives will continue to grow at an average annual rate of 4% in the next four years. The demand growth rate in Europe, North America and the Asia Pacific region (excluding China) is 3%. It is expected that the growth rate of plastic additives in China will be as high as 8% - 10%, and that in other regions will be 5% - 6%. India will be another fast-growing region, because its per capita plastic consumption is still far lower than the average level of industrialized countries

according to the type of additives, except fillers, plasticizers are the most widely used and account for the largest market share, followed by flame retardants, impact modifiers and heat stabilizers. It is expected that the coupling agent will have the largest growth rate in the world of plastic additives, with an average growth rate of 7%. Its main uses include wood plastic composites, polymer alloys and filled polymers. In addition, the demand for nucleation/transparency agents used in the production of transparent polypropylene will also grow rapidly

high efficiency, non-toxic, environment-friendly, complex and multifunctional is the development trend of plastic additives in the world. According to the development trend of plastic additives, ACR and MBS with excellent comprehensive properties are the main modifiers of impact electromagnetic exciter; The research and development of phosphate esters, epoxy esters, fatty acid esters, polyesters and trimellitic acid esters in plasticizers have accelerated; Antioxidants are mainly compound products, especially products with high relative molecular weight; Light stabilizers are mainly hindered amines, and show the characteristics of high relative molecular weight, low alkalization, multifunction, reaction type and functional group diversification. In recent years, many new functional additives have also emerged, including nucleating agents, degradants, infrared barrier agents and so on

1 plasticizer

plasticizer is a kind of additives with the largest output and consumption among plastic additives. At present, the total production capacity of plasticizers in the world is about 7500 kt/A, with a total output of 5900 kt/A, including 22% in North America, 38% in Asia Pacific, 25% in Europe and 15% in other regions. PVC is the largest user of plasticizers, and the amount of plasticizers in PVC accounts for 95% of the total amount of plasticizers. The amount of plasticizers used in polyolefins, styrene, engineering plastics, polyethylene butyraldehyde and cellulose is very small. In the market of plasticizers, phthalates occupy the main position, accounting for 69%; Fat group accounts for 8%; Epoxy accounts for 7%; Trimellitic acid esters account for 4%; Others (including citric acid esters, polymers, carbonates, etc.) account for 12%

the global plasticizer growth is relatively stable, with an average annual growth rate of only about 2%. China's annual growth rate is about 3.5%. The distribution of production capacity is: 17% in the United States, 25% in Western Europe, 11% in Japan, 34% in other Asian countries, and 13% in other parts of the world. ExxonMobil, BASF and Eastman Chemical are the leading plasticizers in the world and North America, with their share in the global market of 15%, 10% and 8% - 9% respectively. Sunoco chemical is the fourth largest company in North America, accounting for 10% of the North American market. The fourth largest company in the world is South Asia plastics company in Taiwan, China, with a 4% share in the world. Other large companies include Degussa in Germany and LG Chemical in South Korea. Other plasticizer companies after the four major companies in North America are smaller, mainly producing phthalate plasticizers

because plasticizers are closely related to the very mature soft PVC market, they develop slowly, but maintain a steady growth momentum. It is expected that the demand will increase at an average annual rate of 2.5% in the future, and will reach 6100 KT by 2009

at present, the production capacity of a single set of plasticizer has reached more than 100 kt/A, and the production trend is to be large-scale, continuous and microcomputer controlled. Due to the relatively good performance and price of DOP, the output and consumption still occupy the leading position of phthalates, followed by DINP (diisopropyl phthalate), DIDP (diisopropyl phthalate). In addition, the development of straight chain alcohol esters is also very fast, which is expected to become an important variety of phthalates. In addition to phthalate plasticizers, fatty acid esters with excellent cold resistance, epoxy esters with strong non-toxic stability, trimellitic acid esters with high temperature resistance, non migrating polyesters, and phosphate esters with good flame retardancy all account for a certain proportion in the structure of plasticizers, forming a plasticizer production system with reasonable structure

$page break $2 flame retardants

the consumption of flame retardants is second only to plasticizers. At present, the global annual consumption has reached 1050 KT, of which North America, Western Europe and Japan are the largest consumption areas of flame retardants, accounting for 30%, 33% and 18% of the consumer market respectively, and Asia (excluding Japan) accounts for 19%. At present, the most widely used are chlorine series, bromine series, phosphorus and halogenated phosphorus series, inorganic series, etc. see Table 1 for the specific consumption structure of various regions in the world

Table 1 world flame retardant consumption structure

Project inorganic organophosphorus chlorine bromine other

Europe 332542810

United States 24268357

Asia 257860 -

Japan 302024 forms a joint with titanium alloy endplate 0 8

unit:%

the latest research report of Freedonia consulting company shows that the global flame retardant market demand is expected to grow at an average annual rate of 4.8% in the next few years, and the demand will reach 2200 kt/A.A, The sales volume will grow rapidly at an average annual rate of 8.5%, mainly because high-value special flame retardant products continue to occupy a larger market share

flame retardants will be developed in the direction of low toxicity, low smoke (or smoke suppression) and low corrosion, and inorganic flame retardants will be more strictly refined and graded, surface active treatment, high fluidity and easy dispersion. Due to the development of electronic equipment and electrical components, the voice of halogen-free flame retardants is strong; Phosphorus flame retardants have good prospects because of their plasticizing and flame retardant functions. Nitrogen phosphorus based intumescent flame retardants and nitrogen based flame retardants will be favored and developed more actively. Brominated flame retardants will continue to develop because of their high efficiency. In a word, low toxicity, low smoke, harmless and efficient compound flame retardants and smoke suppression flame retardants are the general trend of global development

3 heat stabilizer

heat stabilizer is one of the important categories of plastic processing aids. It is synchronized with the birth and development of PVC resin and is mainly used in PVC resin processing. At present, the global annual consumption is about 500 kt, and the main varieties are lead salts, organic tin, metal soaps, composite stabilizers, rare earth stabilizers and organic additives. The consumption structure of heat stabilizers varies in different countries. For example, in the United States, composite stabilizers account for 40% - 50% of the total consumption, and organotin accounts for nearly 40%

Dover chemical company of the United States launched a new generation of high-performance zinc phosphite, so when it comes to the heat stabilizer phosboosters, it can make soft PVC products have better thermal stability and long-term weather resistance. The company's goal is to use this new type of heat stabilizer to replace the mixed metal soap heat stabilizer, so that the PVC processing can completely eliminate toxic heavy metals and significantly reduce the VOC (organic volatile matter) content. In addition, it can also reduce mold fouling and product whitening due to moisture, so it can shorten the switching time required for changing colors and reduce leftover materials, while reducing the cost of colorants in processing plants, especially to effectively prevent PVC degradation and yellowing, which is more obvious for transparent and light colored products

other major heat stabilizer manufacturers have developed various alternatives to cadmium and lead salts, such as akcrostab liquid calcium zinc and barium zinc metal composite stabilizers, a new product of akcros company, and irgstab heat stabilizer for automotive polyurethane components launched by Ciba Specialty Chemical Company, which can meet the VOC reduction requirements

complex rare earth heat stabilizers have formed large-scale production in China in recent years and are developing at a faster speed due to their excellent performance and China's resource advantages

4 impact modifier

impact modifier is mainly used to improve the low-temperature embrittlement of polymer materials and give them higher toughness. There are many varieties of impact modifiers, commonly used are acrylate resin (ACR), Methyl Methacrylate Butadiene Styrene Copolymer (MBS), chlorinated polyethylene (CPE), ABS, ethylene vinyl acetate copolymer, ethylene propylene diene monomer rubber, etc., but from the modification effect of its products, ACR is the one with the best comprehensive performance among impact modifiers; MBS is an important impact modifier for transparent products and plays an important role in the global impact modifier Market; Due to its low price, CPE still accounts for the main share in the domestic market