On the morning of December 3, the groundbreaking ceremony of Anhui Huamao Bio-based Polylactic Acid New Materials Industrial Park and Anhui Xinyuan Biotechnology Co., Ltd.’s Polylactic Acid Fiber Project was held.
Project Overview
On August 28, 2023, Anhui Huamao Textile Co., Ltd. issued an announcement about its planned investment in the construction of a polylactic acid fiber project. It is planned to build a new polylactic acid fiber project with an annual output of approximately 100,000 tons, with a total investment of approximately 600 million yuan. The annual output of the first phase of construction is about 30,000 tons, with an investment of about 210 million yuan.
The project company Anhui Xinyuan Biotechnology Co., Ltd. was established on September 15, 2023.
Anhui Huamao Textile Co., Ltd. is a listed company controlled by Anhui Huamao Group Co., Ltd. Anhui Huamao Group Co., Ltd. was founded in 1958. It is a large enterprise group with the entire textile and clothing industry chain of cotton, spinning, weaving, printing and dyeing, clothing and clothing retail.
About polylactic acid fiber
Miraculous polylactic acid fiber, a promising biodegradable material in the 21st century
Polylactic acid is a biodegradable material and one of the most promising fiber materials in the 21st century. Polylactic acid (PLA) does not exist in nature and needs to be synthesized artificially. The raw material lactic acid is produced by fermentation of wheat, sugar beets, cassava, corn and other crops and organic fertilizers. Polylactic acid fiber can be obtained after spinning and molding. Since most of its raw materials are corn, it is also called “corn fiber”.
1. Development of polylactic acid fiber
Lactic acid was first found in yogurt. Later, scientists discovered that the acid produced by animal and human muscle movements is lactic acid. The polylactic acid polymer material prepared by polymerizing lactic acid was first invented and produced in the laboratory by the American DuPont Company Carothers (the inventor of nylon).
The research and development of polylactic acid fiber has a history of more than half a century. The American company Cyanamid developed polylactic acid absorbable sutures in the 1960s. Nippon Bellbo and Shimadzu Corporation cooperated in 1989 to develop pure polylactic acid fiber (LactronTM) and its blended varieties with natural fibers (Corn
FiberTM) and exhibited at the 1998 Nagano Winter Games; Japan’s Unitika Company developed polylactic acid filament and spunbond nonwoven fabric (TerramacTM) in 2000. Cargill Dow, United States
Polymers (CDP) (now NatureWorks) released a series of products (IngeoTM) covering polylactic acid resin, fiber, and film in 2003, and licensed the German Trevira company to produce the IngeoTM series of nonwoven fabrics for use in automobiles, home textiles, hygiene and other fields.
There are also many units in my country that have carried out related research and development and industrialization of polylactic acid fiber, such as Maanshan Tongjieliang Biomaterials Co., Ltd., Hengtian Yangtze Biomaterials Co., Ltd., Anhui Fengyuan Group, Shanghai Defulun Chemical Fiber Co., Ltd., etc.
2. Process and application of polylactic acid fiber
The current mainstream polylactic acid fibers use high optical purity L-lactic acid (PLLA) as raw material, taking advantage of its high crystallinity and high orientation characteristics, through different spinning processes (melt spinning, wet spinning, dry spinning, dry-wet spinning , electrospinning, etc.) prepared. Among them, melt-spun polylactic acid fiber (filament, short fiber) can be used in clothing, home textiles and other fields. The production equipment and process are close to polyester, and it has good spinnability and moderate performance. After appropriate modification, polylactic acid fiber can obtain better flame retardant (self-extinguishing) and natural antibacterial properties. However, melt-spun polylactic acid fiber still has room for improvement in terms of mechanical strength, high temperature dimensional stability, rebound and anti-aging.
Wet spinning, dry spinning, dry-wet spinning and electrospinning polylactic acid fibers (membranes) are mainly used in the biomedical field. Representative products include: high-strength absorbable sutures, drug carriers, anti-adhesion septa, artificial skin, and tissue engineering. Bracket etc.
With the surge in demand for disposable nonwovens in the fields of medical care, sanitary materials, filtration, decoration and other fields, polylactic acid nonwovens have also become one of the hot spots for research and development.
The University of Tennessee in the United States first studied polylactic acid spunbond and meltblown nonwovens in the 1990s. Japan Shobo subsequently developed polylactic acid spunbond nonwovens for agricultural applications. French Fibreweb developed polylactic acid spunbond. , melt-blown nonwoven fabric and multi-layer composite structure (DeposaTM), in which the spunbond nonwoven fabric layer mainly provides mechanical support, and the meltblown nonwoven fabric layer and the spunbond nonwoven fabric layer jointly provide barrier, adsorption, filtration, and thermal insulation Equivalent performance.
Domestic Tongji University, Shanghai Tongjieliang Biomaterials Co., Ltd., Hengtian Changjiang Biomaterials Co., Ltd. and other units have successfully developed spunbond, spunlace, and hot-rolled composite fibers for nonwovens and nonwovens product development. , hot air and other non-woven fabrics, used in disposable sanitary products such as sanitary napkins and diapers, as well as products such as facial masks, tea bags, air and water filtration materials.
Polylactic acid fiber has also been promoted and applied in automobile interiors, cigarette tows, etc. due to its advantages of natural origin, biodegradability and environmental protection.
3. Characteristics of polylactic acid fiber
One of the widely praised advantages of polylactic acid fiber is that it is biodegradable or absorbed in the body. Biodegradability must be determined under standard composting conditions, and the degradation products are water and carbon dioxide. Conventional polylactic acid fiber in normal use� Or in most natural environments, hydrolysis only occurs slowly or is even difficult to detect. For example, if it is buried in natural soil for one year, it will basically not degrade, but it will degrade in about one week under normal temperature composting conditions.
The degradation and absorption of polylactic acid fiber in the body is greatly affected by its crystallinity. Simulated in vitro degradation experiments show that highly crystalline polylactic acid fiber still basically maintains its shape and nearly 80% of its strength after 5.3 years, and it may take 40-50 years to degrade. completely.
4. Innovation and expansion of polylactic acid fiber
As a chemical fiber variety that has been developed and produced for more than half a century, the current actual usage of polylactic acid fiber is still less than one thousandth that of polyester. Although cost factors are high, performance shortcomings cannot be ignored. Leveraging strengths and avoiding weaknesses through modification is the only way to develop polylactic acid fiber.
my country is a major producer and consumer of chemical fibers and has been in a leading position in research on modified polylactic acid fibers in recent years. Polylactic acid fiber can be blended with traditional natural “cotton, linen, wool and silk” to make woven and knitted fabrics with complementary properties, and can also be blended with other chemical fibers such as spandex, PTT, etc. to make fabrics that are skin-friendly, breathable, and Moisture wicking and other functions have been promoted in underwear fabrics.
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