Surfactant Composition Hard Water Stability
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional surfactant compositions with high surfactant concentrations suffer from reduced solubility, gel formation, and impaired usability, requiring large amounts of organic solvents to maintain fluidity, which are environmentally undesirable, and they deteriorate when diluted with hard water.
Innovation Solution
A surfactant composition blending a mixture of hydroxyalkane sulfonate and olefin sulfonate with a polyoxyalkylene alkyl ether, where the total content of these components is between 35% to 80% by mass, ensuring fluidity across a wide concentration range without clouding when diluted with hard water.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If a high concentration of surfactant is blended to reduce organic solvent usage, then environmental sustainability is improved, but solubility is reduced causing precipitates or strong gel formation that impairs fluidity
Solution Approach 1:
A specific nonionic surfactant acts as an intermediary substance between the anionic surfactant and water, mediating their interaction to prevent gel formation while maintaining high surfactant concentration. The nonionic surfactant with HLB value of 3.0 or less modifies the micellar structure and prevents excessive network formation that would otherwise cause gelation.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention changes the critical parameters of surfactant concentration and HLB value to achieve the desired effect. Specifically, it uses anionic surfactant at 20-80 wt% with a nonionic surfactant having HLB value of 3.0 or less, where the weight ratio of anionic to nonionic surfactant is 9:1 to 1:9. This parameter optimization allows high surfactant concentration while maintaining fluidity.
2Stability of the object's composition
If organic solvents are used to maintain fluidity in high concentration surfactant compositions, then fluidity is improved, but environmental burden and safety issues worsen
Solution Approach 1:
The invention extracts and eliminates organic solvents from the detergent composition by using only water as the solvent. The surfactant blend (anionic surfactant with nonionic surfactant having specific HLB value) is designed to achieve complete water solubility, removing the need for petrochemical-based organic solvents and their associated environmental and safety issues.
Solution Approach 2:
By changing the surfactant composition parameters - specifically using nonionic surfactant with HLB value of 3.0 or less in a weight ratio of 1:9 to 9:1 with anionic surfactant - the invention achieves complete water solubility without requiring organic solvents, thus eliminating environmental burden while maintaining fluidity.
3Productivity
If surfactant concentration is increased to reduce container size and transportation cost, then productivity is improved, but solubility is reduced causing precipitates that impair usability
Solution Approach 1:
The nonionic surfactant with HLB value of 3.0 or less serves as a mediator that enables high anionic surfactant concentration to remain soluble. It modifies the micellar aggregation behavior and prevents precipitate formation, allowing the composition to achieve 20-80 wt% total surfactant concentration while maintaining complete water solubility and usability.
4Ease of operation
If conventional detergent composition is diluted with hard water, then usability is improved, but clouding occurs and detergency deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The invention uses inexpensive inorganic builders (sodium carbonate, sodium sesquicarbonate, or sodium tetraborate) instead of complex organic sequestrants. These simple, water-soluble compounds effectively handle hard water ions without causing clouding or detergency loss upon dilution, providing a cost-effective solution that maintains performance.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The composition achieves significant reduction in organic solvent usage, maintains fluidity at high and low concentrations, and remains effective in hard water without clouding or detergency reduction, making it suitable for various cleaning applications.
Implementation Method 1
a blend of an anionic surfactant and a nonionic surfactant having an HLB value of 3.0 or less
Implementation Method 2
the solubility of the detergent composition is lowered to cause precipitates or generate a strong gel
Data Source
AI summary
Provided is a surfactant composition which includes high concentrations of a surfactant, has fluidity in a wide concentration range, and does not become clouded when diluted with hard water. This surfactant composition includes component A, component B, and component C described below, wherein a total content of the component A and the component B is 35 to 80% by mass and wherein the component A is at least one sulfonate compound selected from the group consisting of a hydroxyalkane sulfonate and an olefin sulfonate, the component B is a polyoxyalkylene alkyl ether, and the component C is water.