Zhongchuxin New Material Technology (Jingzhou) Co., Ltd., relying on its annual production of 15,000 tons of surfactant project, has completed the production process upgrade of N-methyl taurine sodium and implemented the new generation of fully closed-loop ethylene oxide synthesis process. In the industry, the industrialization routes of N-methyl taurine sodium are divided into two major categories: the early traditional route is the high-pressure methylation route of sodium taurate (direct methylation of sodium taurate + methylamine), which is the earliest process route to achieve mass production. This route has limited reaction selectivity and easily produces dimethyl by-products, free amines, and unconverted sodium taurate; the mother liquor is recycled multiple times, inorganic salts continuously accumulate, the product color fluctuates significantly, and the impurity baseline is relatively high. When producing sodium cocoyl methyl taurate and sodium lauroyl methyl taurate in the downstream acylation process, the reaction rate is slow, the conversion rate is unstable, and the finished products easily turn yellow; the mother liquor treatment volume is large, and the output of wastewater and salt residue is high, resulting in great environmental protection and operation pressure.
Currently, the mainstream domestic industrialization EO route: ethylene oxide is first added to prepare sodium hydroxyethanesulfonate, which is then synthesized with methylamine through high-pressure amination. However, the early EO amination route has a long mother liquor recycling chain, high difficulty in controlling sulfate impurities, and the product indicators have a natural upper limit.
The new generation fully closed-loop ethylene oxide process of Zhongchuxin's current process technology upgrade reconstructs the reaction and material recycling system, equipped with a dedicated catalytic system + full-process online monitoring, inhibiting side reactions from the source. Compared with the traditional methylation route, key impurities such as free amines and inorganic salts are controlled to an industry low, the color is stable, and the batch difference is extremely small; the downstream acylation section reacts faster, there are fewer by-products from acyl chloride hydrolysis, and the produced sodium cocoyl methyl taurate and sodium lauroyl methyl taurate are clear and transparent, not easily yellowed or separated during long-term storage. In terms of environmental protection, the material utilization rate of the new process is greatly improved, methylamine is efficiently recovered and recycled, the discharge of mother liquor is greatly reduced, and the generation of wastewater and solid waste is significantly lower than that of the traditional methylation route, making it a low "three wastes" green engineering process that aligns with the low-carbon and green procurement trends of daily chemical raw materials.
ZhongchuXin's two specifications of N-methyl taurine sodium, 62% and 42%, have continuously passed long-term stability tests by multiple leading daily chemical and detergent enterprises and have been included in the core supplier system. The laboratory issues a COA for each batch, and the technical team can cooperate with downstream customers to adjust acylation formulas and prepare products with different technical requirements, fully adapting to the formulation needs of high-end amino acid surfactant personal care, facial cleansing, and detergents.