According to Businesswire in London, Rio Tinto has declared force majeure on customer contracts at Richards Bay Minerals (RBM) in South Africa due to an escalation in the security situation at the operations. This has led to the decision to cease operations until the safety and security position improves.

Rio Tinto chief executive Minerals, Sinead Kaufman, said: “The safety of our people is our top priority.We continue to offer our full support to the investigating authorities and I would like to acknowledge the ongoing support of the regional and national governments and South African Police Service as we work together to ensure that we can safely resume operations.”

Recently, a number of titanium dioxide manufacturers said that the global demand for titanium dioxide is strong and the supply is tight, and the market price may continue to rise. Major producers Chemours, Venator, Tronox and Kronos reported positive results in the first quarter and expect their performance to continue to grow for the rest of this year.

Increase in sales and decrease in inventory

On 4 October, the European Commission decided to classify titanium dioxide in powder form as a substance “suspected of causing cancer in humans”.

This follows an expert hearing (CARACAL) in September in which several EU Member States rejected the classification of titanium dioxide as a carcinogenic. In addition to being classified in category 2 as substance “suspected of causing cancer in humans”, the pigment is added to the list of substances under the Regulation on Classification, Labelling and Packaging of Substances and Mixtures (CLP).

Scientists recently prepared Na-P-zeolite from kaolin and subjected it to a cation-exchange process to achieve anticorrosive and antibacterial effects.

In a new work, Na-P-zeolite was prepared from kaolin and subjected to a cation-exchange process. Source: Coprid – stock.adobe.com.

Specialty chemicals company Clariant has announced a significant expansion of its catalyst production facility in Panjin, Liaoning Province in northeastern China.

MA is an important component of polymers and coatings for the construction, automotive, shipbuilding and energy industries. Source: ra2 studio – stock.adobe.com.
MA is an important component of polymers and coatings for the construction, automotive, shipbuilding and energy industries. Source: ra2 studio – st…
A double-digit million euro investment will further optimise the existing plant and enable the installation of a production line for Clariant’s maleic anhydride (MA) production catalysts. Production is expected to increase from 1.75 million tonnes in 2018 to 2.07 million tonnes in 2022. MA is an important component of polymers and coatings for the construction, automotive, shipbuilding and energy industries.

In an expert hearing (CARACAL) last week, several EU Member States rejected the classification of titanium dioxide as carcinogenic. However, the Commission has announced that it will continue the process anyway.
A total of nine EU Member States have rejected the regulatory package for various reasons. However, it is not the case that the rejecting countries all reject the classification for the same reasons. There are, for example, countries that tend to reject labelling in principle, but there are also a few that regard labelling as too lax.

On the other hand, six Member States voted in favour. The Commission’s current proposal provides that liquid mixtures should not be labelled, but powder coatings should be.

Abstract: Powder coatings have good environmental properties and excellent coating results. This article introduces how to choose titanium white pigments suitable for powder coatings. It is recommended to consider the following properties of titanium dioxide: (1) the type of titanium dioxide; (2) the surface treatment of titanium dioxide; (3) the particle size distribution of titanium dioxide; (4) pH value of titanium dioxide; (5) water content of titanium dioxide.

Part 1: Introduction

Titanium dioxide (TiO2) is the white pigment used to give whiteness and hiding power, also called opacity, to coatings, inks, and plastics. The reason for this is two-fold:

• TiO2 particles of the right size scatter visible light, having wavelength λ ≈ 380 - 700 nm, effectively because TiO2 has a high refractive index
• It is white because it does not absorb visible light
  The pigment is expensive, especially when volume prices of systems are used. Most paint and ink companies buy raw materials per weight and sell their products by volume. As TiO2 has a relatively high density, ρ ≈ 4 g/cm3, the raw material contributes substantially to the volume price of a system.

Introduction

ESA instrumentation setup TINOX Technical Service
Titanium dioxide can be utilized in various applications such as pigment base in paints, coatings, plastics and laminates. During both, the production process at the TiO2 producer and the manufacturing process of paints, coatings and composite materials, avoiding the coagulation and agglomeration of the TiO2 dispersion is important. Surface chemistry of the TiO2 dispersion can be controlled during the measurement of Electrokinetic Sonic Amplitude (ESA) by regulating the pH value e.g. for avoiding flocculation of dispersion. This means: the zeta potential of the dispersion should not be or close to zero. Zeta potential is a dimension of the effective surface charge of particles and the interaction between the particles with ions in solution and particles among each other. Characterising the absolute surface charge (in an aqueous dispersion) of the TiO2pigment, negative or positive in the unit [mV], gives a decisive parameter for an ultimate application of the product. The zeta potential depends on the kind of solvent, the nature and amount of the ions in solution (specific conductivity), and the pH value. It is also the main factor determining the stability of the whole dispersion.