Slack Wax
Slack wax is a material composed of wax and oil. They get this product
in producing engine oils from a substance called Lubcat, which is a kind of oil. In the paraffin production process, slack wax enters the production system
as a feed and after performing processes such as de-oiling and decolorization,
it becomes the final product which is paraffin wax. The oil obtained in this
process converts into another product called Residue wax, which has
many industrial uses. In other words, slack wax is a combination of oil and
wax, one of the petroleum products, and one of the refinery products is crude oil. The amount of product oil can be from 5% to 30%.
Slack wax production
In the past, they considered slack wax as a refinery waste, but now it has a
high demand with a good price in the world markets. Generally speaking,
slack wax produced based on the method of cooling and distillation, can be
heavy or light and the amount of oil determines the quality. For instance,
the melting point of heavy slack wax is more than the light type. For instance,
the amount of oil can be 7%, 10% and 15%. The color of light slack wax is
brighter than heavy type and its melting point is 55-57 degrees Celsius.
As mentioned before, in producing engine oils, they got slack wax from
a substance called lubricant, which is an oil residue. In the paraffin
production process, slack wax enters the production system as a base
material and after performing processes it becomes paraffin wax. It’s
important to know that a wide range of physical properties, efficiency and
melting point make slack wax suitable for various applications and processes. In fact, it has many industrial uses.
Product applications
Slack wax is effective in the production of different paraffin, which is the
raw material of candles, so the final product of slack can be candles. It is also applicable in waterproof compounds in the manufacture of various
industrial products such as emulsions, matches, cables, products. Rust
protection, moisture vapor barrier, polishes, inks, carbon paper
as dust suppressors are other applications of the material.
Product packaging
As a matter of fact, the type of packaging is due to the oil content of the product. For oil up to 7%, you can choose 25 kg carton or bag packaging and 1-ton
jumbo, which of course requires the air to be cold while transporting the goods. For oil above 10%, the packaging can be barrel and flexitank,
which due to the high cost of Flexi, barrel packaging is usually
better for slack wax.
History of Paraffin and wax
Historically speaking, paraffin oil was first discovered in the 19th century
by a German scientist named Karl von Reichenbach. This was at a time
when he was working to increase the efficiency and refining of
petrochemical industry oil compounds. People used paraffin because it was
much cleaner and safer than conventional oils in the candle industry. The discovery of paraffin gave new impetus to the production of candles,
meat packaging and the oil industry in the early twentieth century. They established the paraffin production industry in Iran around 1981 by
its pioneers using domestic technology and facilities, and before that time,
they imported paraffin from abroad due to insufficient production. Qualitative and quantitative growth of the paraffin industry has now made Iran
one of the major exporters of paraffin in the world.
Global demands for the product
Turkey, India and China have the highest export capacity and potential
for exporting this product from Iran. Moreover, the Islamic Republic of Iran
has the closest export link with Turkmenistan. On the other hand,
the Chinese market has the highest demand capacity for these goods. Good
to know that China shows the largest difference between its export potential
and actual exports in terms of value, with a residual export capacity
of $2.1 million.
According to the reports, the global wax market will reach $12.4 billion by 2027. This market growth can apply to the increase in applications such as paints
and coatings, cosmetics. In addition, the ability of waxes as a release agent
and lubricant for engineering resins will be a factor for the growth of the
wax market in the future. Needless to mention that the global market
demand for synthetic waxes is increasing.
In fact, Synthetic waxes have two categories: fully synthetic and semi-synthetic. Both categories apply in the formulation of coatings and printing inks. In terms
of global consumption of mineral wax in 2019, they had the largest share and
this trend will continue in the following years. As an important fact
applications of waxes include paints and coatings, hot melt adhesives,
cardboard making, printing inks, laminating industries, PVC lubricants
and polishing formulations.
According to the reports
in the Asia-Pacific region (especially in China and India), the wax market will grow significantly in the future due to rising living
standards and rapid industrialization. To sum up, to predict the growth
of polyethylene demand, many factors are important, including
consumer demand, revenue and the growth of the packaging industry. Moreover, all of the above variables are related to GDP growth. As the last point
due to the trends in refining and integration of the effects of this sector on
the petrochemical industry and downstream, the share of oil wax
production will decrease in the coming years and the most appropriate
way to compensate for this shortage and growth in global wax,
demand is the use of synthetic waxes.
In short, this substance is a petroleum product; raw material of paraffin wax,
it is a mixture of oil and wax in yellow or brown color, transformed by
pressing to lower the oil size and defiling by specific powders
following the heating to produce paraffin wax.
