Highlights
This was a smaller INDEX conference than
usual with fewer papers and a disappointing number of originals.
No Guarantees – Only Opportunities
Karl-Michael Schumann of Procter and Gamble
introduced and chaired a series of short presentations under the title
“Winning in the market place through technical and commercial innovation.”
Between 1998 and 2002 the dollar value of P&G's nonwoven purchases had
increased by 30% due to the introductions of successful new consumer products
such as Olay® facial cleansing wipes, Thermocare® bandages, Bibsters® baby bibs
and Swiffer Wet-Jet®. Further growth was clearly possible, but a new approach
involved ever-closer collaborative work between P&G and its suppliers. The
current development fashion for conservative, incremental improvements was
essential, but would never drive substantial growth. Breakthrough
developments involving disruptive technology which obsoletes
current assets and requires massive capital would continue to lead to the growth
of whole new industries, but these were essentially unplannable and
uncontrollable. P&G felt that the nonwovens industry should target
Conservative-Breakthrough developments capable of delivering a
step-change in value without requiring massive capital.
A new licensing policy was now giving suppliers
access to all P&G technology, examples being Nodax™, SAN and DEC:
Nodax™, a fully biodegradable and compostible polymer
developed by Dr Noda of P&G Bioplastics from renewable
resources. Dr Noda described the family of polyhydroxyalkanoates as
semicrystalline, thermoplastic polyesters produced directly by bacteria.
Benefits claimed were broadly the same as for Cargill-Dow's polylactic acid
(PLA). Target price when fully commercial was put in the $1.50 - $2.00 range.
Kaneka in Japan has licensed the
polyhydroxybutyrate-hexanoate version Nodax™ and Dr Masahiro Asada
presented its properties saying that PHB-H resembles
polyolefins in properties whereas PLA resembles polystyrene. PHB-H appeared to
have lower strength (about half PLA) this being accompanied by much higher
elongation. Melting temperatures, around 170 o C for the pure PHB, fell to
around 120 o C as 10% of the hexanoate co-monomer was introduced.
John Curro of P&G introduced the
P&G Stretch Apertured Nonwoven (SAN) technology now licensed by BBA
nonwovens. Dennis Tavernetti of BBA described BBA's involvement
with P&G, and reported a great improvement in openness and rate of progress
to new products. SAN technology allows several nonwovens to be combined in a
line-bonding calender, and then laterally stretched so that the fused lines open
up into apertures. This gives very clear holes with fused edges and hence a
better looking, lint free product. BBA are now using it to make coverstock for
newborn and nursing diapers.
John Curro also introduced the related
Differential Elongated Composite (DEC) technology in which a non-elastic fabric
is sandwiched between two elastic fabrics prior to “ring-roll” stretching.
Doug Small of Precision Fabrics Group described their use of
this technology to make the Dryel® dry-clean bag for P&G, and their own
Diamond Dry® absorbent pads used in food packaging. Both products
featured a highly absorbent core, the Dryel® featuring controlled release, and
Diamond Dry® featuring high retention under pressure.
In concluding , Karl-Michael Schumann
called for further innovations in the following areas:
• Improving cost/performance. • Adding functionality such as extreme hydrophilicity, extreme hydrophobicity or controlled pore size distribution. • Improving aesthetics with new textures, sensory properties, colours and patterns. • Using sustainable polymers.
Asked how much extra business would arise from all this
R&D he said there were no guarantees, only opportunities.
PLA Update
Marcel Dartée said Cargill Dow
LLC now employed 230 people and had spent a total of $750 million to
develop polylactic acid to the point where the 140,000 tpa polymer plant in
Blair Nebraska was coming on stream. The company is driven by the need to create
sustainable products by eliminating the need for fossil resources and to deliver
against the triple bottom line of economic, environmental and social targets.
The key attributes of fibre made from the polymer
are:
• Wettability • Low odour retention • Does not support bacterial growth • Transparent to (and hence unaffected by) UV. • Compostable • Flame retardant • Resilient • Stain resistant • Soft and drapy handle 
In response to a question from Procter and Gamble, Mr
Dartée provided information on where CDL expected to sell the 140,000 tonnes of
polymer. It would be split between packaging (film and containers), chemical
intermediates, and fibres (both filament and staple for both nonwovens and
textiles). Would the plant make only one polymer type? Yes, the polymer based on
L-lactic acid. They can add a little D-Lactic acid and will experiment with
copolymers, but these would not be commercial in the near future. Asked about
how the basic fibre properties compared with the main fibres:
• Tenacity was equal to polyester
• Abrasion was between that of polyester and nylon • Exact pilling performance was yet to be established but was likely to be comparable to polyester. • It was more elastic than polyester. • It melted at lower temperatures and this could be used in thermal bonding. Mega-thin Mark II
Reiko Moriya of JATI ( Japan ) provided
further information on their “Mega thin” diaper concept. The new Liquid
Distribution Unit appeared to be a vacuum perforated PE film, thicker and harder
than the Always® topsheet and with bigger holes. This channelled and stabilised
irregular flow to the core and encouraged more spreading and hence more complete
use of the superabsorbent. The core comprised a 40gsm nonwoven with 180 gsm of
superabsorbent powder printed onto it in lines. The new LDU was said to increase
absorbency rate by a factor of 6 and to quadruple the area wetted. Retention
over the range 0.1 to 0.5 psi was fairly constant.
Mega-thin core plus LDU gave 1 st to 3 rd insult times
generally less than half that of commercial diapers. A 100 consumer panel test
was said to have confirmed the superiority shown in laboratory evaluation.
Asked if the film used was commercially available, Dr
Migaku Suzuki, replying on behalf of Ms Mori said it was, and was on display at
this show.
More Permeable Superabsorbents
Dr Edgar Hermann of Hy-Tec Hygiene Technologies
GmbH defined SAP permeability as the liquid flow through a pre-swollen
gel. To improve permeability it was therefore necessary to make SAP particles
that kept their shape when wet and under pressure. This, coupled with the fact
that permeability implies spaces in a gel, means that permeable gels have lower
absorbent capacity than non-permeable gels. To explore this interaction, Hy-Tec
had studied 6 powders, each submitted by a separate producer as illustrating the
best balance of permeability and capacity.
• Permeability Under Load varied from 21-63%. (PUL was
defined as the ratio of AUL of a 5 gm pad of SAP to that of a 0.9gm pad of SAP:
the latter assumed to be fully wettable without permeability coming into
play.
• PUL does not correlate with P&G's “indicative only” Saline Flow Conductivity test for permeability. • Time-dependent absorbency was similar for all. • 4th Insult absorbency varied from 492 to 764 mls. • Sample D gave the best overall ranking, but Dr Hermann could not reveal the identity of the SAP's
He concluded that products with high retention and
permeability were now commercially available.
Steve Christensen of Dow's Drytech
Superabsorbent Products division described ways of controlling the
absorption rate of superabsorbents.
Faster absorbing (less permeable) SAP's could
be made by increasing the surface to volume ratio either by creating wrinkled
particles or by agglomerating fine powders into larger particles using glycerine
or polyethylene imine. Agglomerates tend to either break up too easily in diaper
making or if well bonded, give too low a capacity. Dow has a new binder that
gives high attrition resistance and very fast uptake rate (11 secs on the Vortex
test c.f. 80 secs for the control).
Slower absorbing (more permeable) SAP's can be
made by reversing the above principles, but the big smooth particles which
result can damage diaper backsheets. So, SCA has developed a
cellulosic or gelatin coating to retard the absorption rate of smaller SAP
particles. K-C use divalent metal ions such as calcium to
reduce swelling by ionic cross-linking, these links being destroyed as a second
additive - a cation complexer such as sodium hexametaphosphate - slowly goes
into solution. Dow has used polyvalent ions such as aluminium
to create transient ionic crosslinks that retard the rate without affecting the
final capacity. Mr Christiansen claimed this approach was capable of giving a
SAP with 30g/g capacity and a ten-fold reduction in saline uptake
rate.
Superdry Underpads
Janet Wilson of Shiloh Healthcare (UK)
compared their Superdry underpads with competitive products based on
fluff pulp only, fluff pulp plus SAP, and the original 5-ply tissue based on
recycled paper. (The Superdry product uses a thin pre-formed core from Mc
Airlaid)
• Fluff/SAP gave the best absorbency by weight
(1840gms) but Superdry (1540gms) was second on this basis and best if absorbency
by volume was considered
• EDANA strikethough results also favoured the fluff/SAP pads but Superdry performed best on the rewet test - 0.8gms versus 4gms for the fluff/SAP. • 5-ply tissue gave the best horizontal wicking (2230 cm 2 wetted area). Superdry came second with 1911 cm 2 . • Superdry costs more than the traditional 5-ply tissue but is easier to use and more comfortable for the patients. • Unlike the 5-ply tissue product, Superdry has tested free of bacterial contamination. • The product has recently been introduced on contract to the British National Health Service (annual purchases of underpads put at £5.25million), and several Trusts are now buying it in preference to the cheaper product. Basic Disposables
Dr Richard Chapas (Consultant)
suggested developing sustainable disposable products for marketing to
the “base of the population pyramid”, the 4 billion people living on less than
$1500/year, 2 billion of whom exist without access to power or petrol. Products
for this sector would have to be simple, biodegradable (cellulose based) and
manufacturable by systems compatible with the infrastructure of the target
region. (“Roll goods to be converted at the village level”)
No Value Added
Andrew Urban III, Consultant , reviewed
some classic technical successes that led to commercial failures:
Weyerhaeuser's Giggles™ Diapers used an
ultrathin compressed core made by impregnating an air-laid pulp with glacial
acrylic acid and polymerising it “in situ”. The resulting superabsorbent was
electron beam cross-linked and stripped of monomer using steam. It then acted as
the glue to bond the pulp/SAP structure together as it was compressed in a
calender. The resulting near-perfect dispersion of SAP in pulp resisted gel
blocking and expanded freely on wetting. Sandwiched between coarse polyester
subfacing and a textile-like backsheet, in a diaper that in 1985 already
featured the first leg gathers and elastic waists, it was superior to the
P&G ad K-C products in all but price. Weyerhaeuser test-marketed in Seattle
and unexpectedly came up against P&G's more lavish test marketing of their
first leg-cuffed diaper, failing in comparison.
Pope and Talbot's retail AI products
used an ultra-thin thermally bonded air-laid pulp with high-SAP content
at a time (1990) when the competition was bulky (K-C Depends® and J&J's
Serenity®) However in this case the P&T range was cheaper and easier to fit
and wear discreetly than the opposition. Why did it fail? In Mr Urban's view
P&T's marketing and sales efforts had been underfunded.
P&G's Uni-Futur™ diapers ,
introduced into Mexico in 1995 as an even more cost effective upgrade to their
basic low-tech Uni™ diaper. Despite a unique semi-elastic narrow “bikini” shape,
the usual lavish market introduction and a 20% price cut, it failed to sell.
Apparently consumers could not believe that a product so thin and small could
work properly. Worse still, Mr Urban argues this failure adversely affected the
Pampers™ name in Mexico causing P&G's share to decline from 20%+ to 10%- in
subsequent years.
Evolution at work
Oliver Bittner of Freudenberg Vliesstoffe KG (
Germany ) described how their spunlaid and water-jet-split bico fibre
nonwovens could make very good durable industrial wipes. After splitting in
hydroentanglement they comprised 0.1 micron fibres which gave better wiping
because they could get into smaller crevices on surfaces. The anisotropic
fabrics were easy to convert, cuttable in any direction without fraying,
weldable and heat sealable. Being made from polyamide - polyester bicomponent
filaments they could be washed at 95 o C, bleached and tumble dried many times.
Spunlace progress
Under the heading “New Possibilities in Spunlace”
Thomas Fechter of Fleissner GmbH ( Germany ) mentioned :
• A Nomex/PET 2-layer laminate for hot air filters. • Another hot air filter using woven steel mesh sandwiched in Nomex. • A filter made of 1.7 dtex PET sandwiched between 6.7 dtex PET. • A wipe made from 2.2 dtex viscose on top of yellow 1.7dtex PP. This had been patterned, apparently after the main bonding stage, by further hydroentanglement on a drum so that yellow squares showed through on the white side. • A wipe with a rough side created by a square pattern, and a fine smooth side. • Cotton pads with a dimpled surface. • Cotton pads with a wavy jet-line surface achieved by oscillating the last hydroentanglement nozzle.
Efficient patterning on a fully entangled fabric
requires three jet strips in a single head so that the jets reinforced each
other before any relaxation (disentanglement) can take place.
World production of spunlace in 1999 was put at 240,000
tonnes.
Theoretical Wipes Market
After reviewing the 2000 Edana statistics related to
wipes growth (152,200 tonnes, of which 78,000 were in personal and baby wipes,
42,000 in industrial, the rest being in household) Sabine Martini
(Consultant) calculated the total size of the baby wipe market based on
birth rates and the assumption that 8000 wipes were needed for each baby. This
figure was in turn based on known diaper sales and the assumption that 2 wipes
would be needed per diaper change. A theoretical EU15 market potential of 33.8
billion wipes emerged for 2001, compared with actual sales of 16.7 billion to
give a current market penetration of 49%. In Germany , the most developed
market, the figure was 56%. In-store price comparisons showed UK mothers paying
twice as much for their baby wipes as German mothers.
Air Laid Problems
Ivan Pivko (Consultant) reviewed
developments in air-laid nonwovens since Index 99 and speculated on possible
developments in the next three years. The key points since 1999 were:
• Massive capacity additions - Buckeye, Concert, BBA ( China ), Main Spa ( Italy ) • No breakthrough in diaper cores to use the capacity, hence overcapacity problems now. • Rayonier's smaller investment in “Novothin” cores appears to be paying off. • K-C's move back into air-laid with Cottonelle roll wipes failing to live up to expectations. • Air-laid being unexpectedly promoted by Georgia Pacific after the acquisition of Fort James . • Air-laid proving to be less than ideal for the wipes market c.f. hydroentanglement. • The wipes business passing the $1bn sales mark last year, withv spunlace now moving ahead faster than airlaid. In the next 3 years:• Airlaid capacity will reach 750,000 tonnes. • The industry will then pause, reflect and consolidate rather than expand further. • Costs will be reduced as new investments have their effect. • Waste reclamation will be improved. • Air-laid wipes will decline prompting further spun lace expansion. BUT Will P&G or K-C accept the Buckeye or Concert core products? • What if aggressive moves into airlaid by SCA or the newly expanded Tyco Healthcare prompt defensive responses from P&G and K-C? (i.e. cornering the Buckeye/Concert capacity) • Could SCA in return acquire the old J&J air-lay or Georgia Pacific's Minnesota capacity? • Could Tyco Healthcare, now testing Novathin®, could commit to Rayonier's ideas for a 100,000 tonne line? • What if BBA acquire Concert?
Asked about his gloomy prognosis for airlaid in wipes,
Mr Pivko commented that the product was proving too harsh to compete with
spunlace in personal care wipes, and the short fibre content prevented it
matching spunlace for abrasion resistance in household wipes.
Another Air-layer
Jean-Philippe Dumon of Thibeau/Asselin NSC
Nonwoven (France) introduced AirWeb®, an air laying system intended to
take card-web, disperse the fibres in air and lay them randomly in basis weights
from 35 to 200gsm without the need for cross-lappers and web drafters. Similar
systems from Fehrer and Hergeth were described and said to be in production
mainly for make-up removal pads. Mr Dumon claimed a more random lay (MD/CD
<1.5) over a wider weight range (35-200gsm) at higher productivity (200-260
kg/hr/m) giving fibre individualisation and web appearance comparable to carded
products.
Reicofil IV
Bernd Kunze of Reifenhauser GmbH ( Germany )
revealed the targets for the Reicofil 4 spunbond technology:
• Higher throughput per beam, allowing fewer beams at the same line speed. • Independent adjustment of cooling, stretching and lay-down sections giving more control of MD/CD ratios • 5500 m/min spinning speeds for PET and 3500m/min for PP to give line speeds up to 700m/min • Fiber deniers down to 1.0 • Fabric weights down to 10 gsm. • Potential throughput up by 22 to 50% over Reicofil 3. Polyethylene Spunbonds
Dr Derek Budgell of BBA Linotec Development GmbH
provided data on the properties of low- and high-density polyethylene
spunbonds. When spun on the same system, PE nonwovens gave about a third of the
tensile strength of PP, the LDPE version giving about 50% higher elongation,
while the HDPE version was about 20% less extensible than the PP. HDPE had a
less waxy handle, but LDPE was softest. Both had reduced fibre tie-down and
hence lower abrasion resistance than PP. PE is however better in radiation
sterilisation than PP because it cross-links to higher molecular weights where
PP suffers degradation by chain scission. A major application of spunbond PE is
ostomy bag covers where the skin-comfort of the ultra-soft fibre is preferred.
Silane Quat Antimicrobial
Patrick Vandendaele MD of Devan Chemicals (
Belgium ) presented the Aegis paper on silane quat
antimicrobials:
• Conventional antimicrobials leach from PP fibres to form, in efficacy testing on agar culture plates, a “zone of inhibition” on which the organisms cannot grow. • At the boundary of this ZOI most organisms are killed, but the few that survive are those with enhanced resistance to the biocide. • If cultures are taken of these survivors, and the tests are successively repeated, it has been shown that bacteria can develop complete resistance to the biocide in just three generations. • The Dow-Corning organofunctional silane compounds (as used in medical nonwovens and consumer textiles since 1976) to create an antimicrobial that bonds to PP with excellent durability. (non-leaching) • It's a 3-trimethoxy silyl propyl dimethyl octadecyl ammonium chloride on a lipophilic aliphatic chain, also known as AEM 5772 or Aegis Microbe Shield. • It bonds to the PP through the silyl group and kills bacteria - without being destroyed itself - by physically penetrating the cell membrane with the aliphatic chain “sword” before “electrocuting” it with the charged nitrogen atom on the quaternary ammonium group. • The compound can be added to the PP spin-finish or padded onto the nonwoven. • Socks, underwear, bedsheets, waddings and carpets are among the other applications. • On carpets, it destroys the symbiotic fungi on which the dust-mite depends, and so prevents dust-mite colonies from developing. • Its presence on a fabric can be highlighted with bromo-phenol blue indicator. In response to questions:Application temperature governs the wash stability of the antimicrobial: the higher the better, 200 o C being no problem for the chemical. 140 o C is recommended for PP fibres, 170 o C for PET. It attaches by copolymerising to the synthetic fibre surface. On cellulosics the methoxy group bonds just like a reactive dye. The finish typically survives 5 washes at 95 o C. 0.15% add on is recommended for shoe linings with levels up to 0.25% being possible. It can not be added to the polymer melt: must be a spin finish to work properly. Lamination on a Perforator
Jim Cree (Marketing Manager) and Bill Deep
(Global Product Manager) of Tredegar Film Products ( USA ) described
how the vacuum-perforation process used to make apertured films could be adapted
to produce laminates. Extruding the film-forming polymer onto a PP nonwoven
prior to passing the combination, film side down, around the suction drum while
the film was still plastic produced a two-layer product. A second layer of film
could then be extruded onto the “male” side of the perforated film to give an
even bulkier product without perforations. A wide variety of possible nonwovens
coupled with a wide range of possible films and several different aperturing
patterns led to an enormous array of possible end products. Those mentioned
specifically were:
• A 35gsm spunlaced nonwoven laminated to 20gsm PE film to give a 2-surface wiping effect. (e.g. Scouring and absorbing) • Such wipes held the lotion better than all-fibre wipes (gravity drainage restricted by the film) • Film laminated to 13 gsm spunbond to give a diaper backsheet. • Elastic laminates for waistbands, side panels and medical bandages. • Ostomy bag covers • A 60gsm nonwoven attached to a 20 gsm film to give an improved strength dry wipe (Swiffer®-type)
The process works best for layers of similar melting
points otherwise compatiblisers are needed.
Lamination on a slitter
Alessandrio Celli's (A. Celli SpA Italy )
paper included some details of the hot-melt lamination stage being
built, thanks to a collaboration with Nordson, into a full speed
slitter/rewinder. On-line lamination of spunbond to breathable film was
mentioned.
Compressive Bulking
Richard Walton of Micrex Corporation
(USA )explained that it was wrong to think of
microcrepeing compaction ratios as stretch in reverse. If a fabric was
compressively creped from 100m long to 50 m long, this was a 50% compaction, but
when stretched back to 100m under tension, the stretch was 100%.
He could now build machines up to 3m wide capable of
running at 200-300 m/min. Price of a 2m wide unit was ~$500,000 and he was now
building these to be operated on-line on an HE wet-wipe machine. Micrex has
recently patented an improved process that provides bulk which is resistant to
wetting out. In this process, 16% compaction gives:
• 79% more dry thickness • 66% more wet thickness • 49% more lotion capacity per wipe • 26% faster wet out • 33% increase in absorbency (g/g)
Samples of Micrex-treated and untreated spunlace wipes
were provided to illustrate the improvements arising from this simple bulking
and softening treatment.
Hot Melts
Alan Ramspeck of Nordson Corporation (USA)
elaborated on the three rules for efficient non-contact spray
application of hot-melt glues in core stabilisation and elastic
attachment:
• Larger glue filaments form stronger bonds because, despite the lower coverage at constant weight : • They retain heat better • They bridge gaps better • They flow better to create a bigger bond • Filament crossovers give stronger bonds:• They create a rip-stop effect (its more difficult to start a tear than to propagate it.) • Double thickness=larger fibres (see 1 above) • Mini-spirals give more crossovers than larger spirals, (but these crossovers should be at the centre rather than the edge of the spiral pattern.) • Lower Variability minimises waste. This can be achieved by optimising multi-strand attachment by fine tuning of the nozzle-to-elastic configuration. (a 5-10mm pattern width gives good results)
However on very thin substrates, the pursuit of strength
and efficiency may be secondary to maintaining a good appearance and handle.
Here finer filaments applied at higher frequencies will minimise bleed through
and distortion.
Cooler Melts
Bill Leftwich of National Starch & Chemical
(UK) suggested that the Coolmelt adhesives used in packaging and
bookbinding should be of interest to the nonwovens industry.
Coolmelts have the same range of viscosity as hotmelts,
but achieve this at a about 30 o C lower temperature. As a result lighter
substrates could be bonded with less heat distortion, 90 o C application
temperatures becoming usable in production. Odour levels were lower, and thanks
to the adhesive packs being made of the same polymer as the adhesive, packaging
waste was eliminated. The products were also proving excellent for core
stabilisation and attachment of the newer, more elastic frontal tapes.
However there were several “challenges” to be borne in
mind by the converter:
• Bleed through leading to blocking could be a problem if the temperature of application is too high. • High compression levels in diaper packing could make matters worse. • Ditto high ambient storage temperatures.
Mr Leftwich concluded by suggesting that the cooler melt
products would allow manufacturers to build in more functionality than their
hotter counterparts.
Metallocene PP Fibers and Nonwovens
Flemming Stengaard presented the
Fibervisions a/s ( Denmark ) paper on novel fibres for
value-added nonwovens. In essence these fibres were fine denier PP made from an
ATOFINA isotactic metallocene resin on a long-spin line. Compared with the usual
Ziegler Natta catalysed PP, the metallocene process gives a narrow molecular
weight range and hence finer fibres, a higher molecular orientation, double the
tensile strength but with reduced elongation and toughness. A further
consequence of the long-spin route is the surface oxidation that yields
filaments with a distinct skin-core structure.
The resulting 1.0 to 1.5 dtex fibres perform well in
thermal bonding to give more uniform nonwovens with smaller pores and improved
softness.
Mr Stengaard pointed out that the metallocene process is
still under development and that further improvements could be expected. For
instance the second generation of metallocene resins would give properties
midway between current metallocenes and ZNPP.
Marc van der Elst of ATOFINA , in a
related paper covered similar ground but added data on the performance of the
metallocene PP in spunbonds and SMS. The finer stronger fibres obtained from
metallocene resins allow the production of lighter spunbonds without loss of
strength, uniformity or cover.
Angelo Lonardo of Basell Polyolefins (Italy)
said their metallocene catalysed PP resins were superior to the
peroxide treated Ziegler-Natta PP because they gave spunbonds with higher
tenacity, softer handle, better barrier properties and better uniformity. They
also have the potential to be spun at lower melt flow rates. In melt-blown
processing, 1200 and 2000 MFR resins had been converted into a range of
industrial and hygienic nonwovens. These resins processed better than peroxide
degraded ZNPP giving finer fibres, better barrier properties and lower
volatiles. Conversion to staple fibres on both long and short spin lines gave
better fibres and the potential of improved thermal bondability.
Cotton-Like Flax
Elena Kuchkova of the Russian Nonwovens Research
Institute described the use of a soft cotton-like flax fibre to make
medical nonwovens using hydroentanglement. Details of the “physico-chemico”
process used to prepare this particularly pure form of flax were not provided,
but it was said to create surface of amorphous cellulose, capable of high
absorbtion and with an ability to inhibit microflora development.
A 50/50 rayon/flax hydroentangled fabric gave 16cms
vertical wicking in 20 minutes compared with 12cms for a 50/30/20 flax/rayon/PET
blend. (No data on 100% rayon) In a separate trial, 100% rayon fabric gave
10.2gm/gm absorbent capacity while the 50/50 rayon/flax blend gave 11.3gm/gm. In
yet another trial a 60gsm “flax-containing dressing napkin” gave 14gm/gm against
the rayon control value of 10. Clinical trials were said to indicate a
preference for the flax containing dressings because they had lower adhesion to
wounds than the rayon/PET controls.
Antimicrobial Acrylic
Roland Cox of Acordis Acrylic Fibres (UK)
classed their Amicor™ antimicrobial fibres as “moderately hydrophilic
fibres containing additives that are able to migrate”. The two biocidal
additives used in Amicor™ fibres are registered with the Biocidals Directive and
are unlikely to encounter any difficulties with this new legislation. Bedding
products containing Amicor™ were clinically proven to help prevent allergies
from dust-mites. Hospital and food-preparation textiles containing Amicor™ had
now been shown resist the development of such organisms as Staph. aureus,
Salmonella, E Coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, MRSA, and, in air filtration systems,
legionella. The biocidal activity survives 200 washes at 100 o C.
Radiation affects performance?
Mario José Araújo Marques Abreu, a lecturer at
Minho University ( Portugal ) reported on the effects of gamma
irradiation and electron-beam sterilisation procedures on the liquid
permeability and air permeability of surgical gowns. The effects were small, but
electon-beam tended to increase the repellency while gamma irradiation increased
the air permeability.
Non-isothermal moisture vapour transmission
Ji Young Ruckman of Manchester Metropolitan
University (UK) has tested breathable and non-breathable pads both
isothermally and with a temperature gradient. She found the temperature gradient
allowed very much higher moisture vapour transmission rates – up to 5500 gms/m 2
/24 hours if the product was “non-synthetic”. Synthetic breathable films tended
to lose their permeability under non-isothermal conditions because condensation
blocked the pores. She found her measurements correlated with her own one-woman
wearer trial, and was now planning a 25 person trial.
Irritating Problems
Christine Wild of Cognis GmbH ( Germany )
pointed out that the conventional hydrophilic spin-finishes used on
polypropylene have a high potential for irritating human skin and are easily
washed off the fibers. Versions conferring more permanent hydrophilicity have
been developed and are in use, but these prove unacceptable in long-life
products or in products where high or multiple wettings are the norm such as
wet-laid processes or wet-wipes.
Cognis has therefore developed Standapol 1345 as an
internal additive where FDA approval is required, and Standapol 1474 where the
fibres produced must be immediately wettable without further on-line finishing.
These resin additives concentrate in the amorphous areas of the polymer and get
pushed to the outer surface in hot-stretching. However low molecular weight
resins for melt-blowing allow easy migration of the additives to the fibre skin
without stretching. Effects of the resin additives on other nonwoven properties
such as tensiles and absorbency are negligible but there is a useful increase in
fabric softness.
Dr Wild foresaw applications in coverstock and wipes and
felt the permanently hydrophilic resins could even be used as the skin on a
regular PP core in bicomponents. In a wipes-related absorption test the
permanently hydrophilic PP fibres containing the Standapol additive were blended
50/50 with polyester in a spunlaced fabric and shown to have 20% better
absorbent capacity than the 65/35 viscose/PET control.
Drape analysed
Chang Kyo Park of Chonam University ( Korea )
has used image analysis to extract more information about fabric drape
(e.g shape and number of folds) from what was, in essence, a Cusick drape
tester.
Fantasy fibres
Dr Giuseppe Salvio of Montefibre ( Italy )
described new “multifunctional” polyester fibres obtained by combining
otherwise well known premium features. Antimicrobial flame retardant fibres and
coloured flame retardant fibres were the two examples given but clearly there
are many other possibilities.
C R Woodings April 2002
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20 years of service to the International Nonwoven and Fibre Industries.
Thursday, 25 April 2002
INDEX 02: Geneva - 16-19th April 2002
Monday, 28 January 2002
INDA’s Vision 2002: New Orleans 20-23rd January
Key Points
Consumer Products Workshop
This introductory session included some statistics based
on INDA's 2000 US Nonwovens Industry Estimates, provided by Ian Butler, INDA's
Acting Marketing Director:
Diapers
• Since 1992, birth rate has been static, and diaper
sales have declined from 18.5 billion units to an estimated 17 billion units in
2002, due to improved performance. However, coverstock use has grown from 0.2 m
2 /diaper 10 years ago to 0.38m 2 /diaper last year due to its increased use in
cuffs and new uses in backsheet and fastenings.
• 11 billion square metres of coverstock were split between diapers (68%), adult incontinence (15%), training pants (9%), femcare (5%) and underpads (3%). • Todays diapers contain more than 75% nonwovens (by dollar value). • INDA expects future diapers to be even thinner, with better fit (elastication of components), better softness (finer fibres and softer resins), and better absorbency (better cores - air laid a possibility). • Current market share figures put Pampers/Luvs in the lead with ~40%, Huggies with ~35%, Tyco/Paragon with ~20%, and other private label ~5%. Wipes
• The North American market used 2.1 billion m 2 of
nonwoven in wipes, 70% of this being consumer wipes and 30% industrial and
institutional.
• Baby wipes accounted for 56% of the Consumer wipes total, 25% was Household, 10% Personal care, 5% automotive care, and 4% wet toilet. • Household was the most dynamic sector, growing at about 20% year from a 400 million m 2 base in 2000 due to a proliferation of products tailored for specific uses e.g. • Hard surface wipes (Chlorox, Mr Clean) • Electrostatic dusters including mitts (Swiffer, Pledge, Endust) • Disinfecting wipes (Mr Clean) • Polishing cloths (Pledge) • Glass cleaners (Chlorox) • Specific products included a Vileda equivalent to Swiffer (Ex Static?), Swiffer WetJet with its diaper like absorbent pad and spraygun for cleaning fluid. • The Sage range of microwavable bathing wipes now had competition from a Kimberly Clark product. • Personal care wipes comprise Body and Femcare (52%), Wet Toilet (28%), Make-Up removal (12%) and Adult Incontinence (8%). • Olay “Total Effects” cleansing wipes used a laminate of spunlace (soft side) and apertured/textured tissue paper (exfoliating side)
With regard to the wet-toilet sector, while the folded
products were established and doing well, it was too early to judge the product
- the initial burst of sales being due to pipeline filling.
 It's a No-Brainer
Dr James Smith of the University of North Carolina –
Chapel Hill, one of the top economic forecasters in the US opened the conference
proper with an overview of the US economy.
• In his view the recession is over. He expects to see 4.2% growth in 2002 then 3.2% p.a. for the rest of the decade. (He admitted being more optimistic than other forecasters) • Putting this in perspective, growth over the last decade averaged 3.2% and that had been the best decade since the 1650's. • 2000-2001 was the third recession in recent times, the first being the oil-shock of 73-75 and the second being caused by the Louvre Accord in 90-92. • However the Christmas quarter of 2001 was 5% above the same quarter in 2000, and January 2002 showed excellent consumer confidence.
His view was based on several factors:•
Many people had refinanced their mortgages, releasing a total of $130bn of extra
spending power into a total economy of $10 Trillion.
• Government had committed $19bn to stimulate growth • Government defence spending was increasing sharply. • The dollar will remain strong: $1.5bn/day of new investment is flowing into the USA .
Globally the opportunities for economic growth are
unprecedented if freer trade can be developed:
• Half the world's population now live on less than $2/day and 1.4bn people on less than $1/day. • Half the world's population have never made a phone call, and 90% have never flown. • China is now a member of the WTO and great opportunities will arise from freer trade with it's 1.2 billion people • Unfortunately the Chinese opportunity is long-term. Their GDP per capita last year ($450) was the same as it was in 1900 and that gives it about the same impact on the world economy as Texas . (“It'll be 50 years before it can have the same impact as California !”) • India will be the world's most populous country in 20 years, but its GDP per capita is only half that of China.
In comparison, every school in the US is now on the
Internet and every freshmen is expected to have a laptop.
Will nonwovens continue to grow? It's a no-brainer.
Disposables make life easier and people are getting wealthier. Of course they're
going to grow.
Asked about the Euro economy, Dr Smith felt it was not
in good shape. The big four, Germany , France, Italy and Spain were all showing
slow growth. The UK was doing better, but here the strong pound was killing
manufacturing industry, a fact that would lead the UK into the Euro sooner
rather than later. The exciting possibility for Europe related to it's potential
for geographic expansion. When the next 6 countries waiting in the wings are
allowed in, the expansion of the workforce will allow more growth. Turkey (the
Mexico of Europe) would be next, and maybe even Russia would follow. With the EU
being similar in size to the US now, it would soon become an economic force to
be reckoned with.
Mercosur Rising
Raphael Valdez of BFA S.A. reviewed the prospects for
nonwovens in this customs union comprising Argentina , Brazil , Paraguay and
Uruguay , a market of 219 million people with a GDP of $900bn. Imports amounted
to $86.7bn and exports to $84.5bn. The union is as yet “imperfect”, perfection
being defined as zero internal tariffs and identical external tariffs
irrespective of country. (The EU was a perfect union by this definition) Duty
levels varied from zero to 35% on imports, the top level being applied to the
politically sensitive textile imports which unfortunately included nonwoven
fabrics. Nonwoven products duty varied from 28% to 35%.
Mercosur produced a total of 88,000 tonnes of nonwovens
per year, spunbonds being the majority (68,400 tonnes/year), followed by
card/thermal (18200 tpa) and air-lay (1400 tpa). It imported 11,000 tpa and
exported 10,000 tpa, giving a 0.4kgs per-capita consumption of nonwovens or
about one-tenth of the US figure. Growth potential was therefore obvious.
Moves towards expansion of this economic union, first
with the Andean countries, could be expected to start at the end of 2002, then
with the USA in 2003 and with the EU in 2005. Also in 2005 Mr Valdez expected
the first moves to a Free Trade Area of the Americas , i.e. a union of all 34
countries of North, Central and South America to commence with a few products.
He recommended nonwovens producers to start positioning nonwovens for the South
American market now and to get NW's included in the agreements for these further
integrations. Now was the time to plan installation of production facilities in
the region forboth roll goods and finished products. The landed price of
nonwovens imported from the US would be 50-55% above the FOB price, and this was
unlikely to change before 2010.
East Asia Outlook
Peter Bohlander presented year 2000 economic data for
northern hemisphere countries to the east of Bangladesh . Total population in
the countries considered was 2 billion growing at rates varying from 0.18 to
4.1%, with China 's 1.2 billion population growing at 1% distorting the
statistics. The region was adding 114 million consumers every 5 years. In terms
of GDP, the total of $7.3 trillion was dominated by Japan 's $4.7 trillion and
China 's $1.1 trillion, Mr Bohlander pointing out that China , with 10 times the
Japanese population, would soon be the biggest economy in the region. Annual
income per capita averaged $3,617 with Japan , Honk Kong and Singapore all
around $24,000. In China , the wealthiest 400 million people earn on average
$2400/year. 9.2% of China 's GDP comes from exports to the USA , compared with
31% of Malayasia's GDP and 4.7% of Japan 's.
Local Factors of importance for US companies wishing to
trade in the region:
• Religion: more so after Sept 11 th . The radically Islamic areas ( Indonesia and Malaysia ) will be difficult. • Ethnic Heritage: Cultural differences between Japan , China , Korea and the Muslim countries will prevent it being a homogeneous market. • Environmental laws: Korea and Japan are strict, others less so, but all will become tighter and hence less favourable to disposables. • Endless red-tape. Need to hire local experts. • Lack of respect for Western patents, copyrights and trademarks. This should get better with China in the WTO, if it sets an example.
Asked at what per capita income people start buying
disposables, Mr Bohlander felt this would happen as earnings went above
$10-12,000 per year, commenting that 100 million Chinese in the coastal region
were already in this category.
P&G's Needs in the 21 st Century
Scott Burns, P&G's Assistant Director of Global
Nonwovens Purchasing, in what appeared to be their third paper intended to raise
their visibility in nonwoven industry circles, described what customers were now
requiring from their suppliers. At the top was an ability to provide products
with Unique Value and to do this to P&G's satisfaction, a supplier would
have to focus on 4 key areas:
• R&D, leading to proprietary technology which could readily be commercialised globally. • Building strong relationships with P&G at a personal level, and constantly renewing these. (Companies are perpetually reinventing themselves) • Cost management: constantly striving to be the lowest cost manufacturer, working closely with P&G on reducing all other costs. (“Anything that does not add value for our customers is waste”) • Having global presence linked to regional excellence.
Echoing the theme of his European colleague Dr Raine
Schoene at the Outlook conference in Monte Carlo last September, he emphasised
that P&G had a unique ability to commercialise good ideas, but were now
increasingly looking to their suppliers as a source of those ideas. They hoped
to be able to partner companies who could deliver proprietary technology from
“platforms flexible enough to support multi-generational opportunities.”
Mr Burns placed great emphasis on the importance of
relationships and the need to create and manage unique bonds with feedstock and
equipment suppliers. Relationships, especially those which were strong outside
the business environment would be needed to build both short- and long-term
successful partnerships. He felt trust was the key and recommended Jordan
Lewis's book, “Trusted Partners” to those who were interested in exploring his
theme more deeply. He also felt that suppliers should recognise the importance
of women in these relationships: P&G's products targeted women, and
P&G's development teams were necessarily heavily staffed with women.
Suppliers who fielded all-male teams were probably missing something.
Interestingly, P&G were finding that smaller
privately-owned companies had the advantage of being able to take a longer view
(no quarterly reports to shareholders to worry about) and made excellent
partners. Furthermore, an analysis of P&G's customers showed that Hispanic
and African Americans were the most loyal, and suppliers should know that
P&G is committed to rewarding these groups wherever possible. Minority-owned
businesses (and businesses owned by women) were always welcome in Cincinnati
.
Building Partners
Mike Brands, President of Partnership by Design expanded
on the benefits of customer and supplier working together in a true partnership.
It was entirely logical that such relationships would achieve more than the
simple “buy-sell” sort, and with raw materials being the largest component of
hygiene products costs, the closest possible relationships with suppliers was
especially important. These can only be built with top management support;
information sharing has to be total, the two companies operating as a single
entity for their mutual benefit. Sharing mechanisms included joint teams
responsible for R&D, Manufacturing etc, all being controlled by a Steering
Committee comprising the top management of both companies.
Measurement of the key elements of the total process was
necessary to provide the vital feedback leading to the next round of
improvement. The key areas for attention and measurement in a hygiene product
company were:
• Material Quality at all points in the production chain to be measured and constantly reviewed – especially for impact of raw material variations on finished product cost and quality. • Service: how the supplier supports the customer in shipping, handling returns, rejects etc. • Cost: Price is less important than a suppliers ability to optimise his process to suit the customer, and most important of all is total collaboration on the design of new products with an agreement to share the wealth generated by improvements.
Rusty Thompson of H.B.Fuller Co. reviewed the benefits
of supply chain management. He was in favour of expanding the definition of
purchasing to include any corporate expenditure, even staffing, software,
education and training. Suppliers must be increasingly fast, flexible and
efficient, providing on-line access for ordering, checking the progress of
orders, shipment quality etc.
Customers should reward suppliers willing to provide
this on-line information by providing:
• Accurate forecasts of future demand • Longer term supply agreements • Standardised specifications • Help in developing mutually beneficial new technology. Research Matters!
Anthony Breitzmann (standing in for Fran Narin) observed
that 95% of the patents issued currently were useful for decorating the
inventors office and little else. Nevertheless, skilled analysis of the patent
databases could yield useful information about companies and their strategy.
Mining this information had allowed his company, CHI Research, to patent a
patent-analysis method which correlated with stockmarket value of technology
companies. USP 6,175,824 provides the details but the key point was that patent
counts had to be weighted with “quality measures” such as citation impact,
science linkages, innovation speed, countries covered, and percentage maintained
as opposed to lapsed.
• The more a patent is cited by other patents, the more
useful it is and the more successful the owning company is likely to be. (Key
inventions spur others into innovation in an attempt to capitalise on the
novelty or get round the original patent.)
• Leading edge inventions tend to cite links with scientific literature rather than other patents. Incremental inventions tend to cite other patents. • The faster the technology cycle time, (the time between current patents and the previous generation cited) the more successful the company. • Significant patents are filed in the most countries. • Costs of maintaining patents are not insignificant: companies only spend where the patents have a payback.
The method works best on the US patent database, but
fails with Japanese patents (no citations). It can be applied to most other
countries. It works only with industries where patents matter such as
pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, telecommunications, semiconductors, chemicals,
plastics, automotives, aerospace etc., but in these sectors patent indicators
are a better predictor of stockmarket success than the traditional financial
measures (P/E ratio, earnings, sales etc.). A fund based on patent indicators
would have outperformed the S&P 500, Dow and Nasdaq in the last 3, 5, 10,
and 12 years. In comparison 95% of mutual funds have been outperformed by the
S&P 500 in the last 5 years.
Innovation at 3M
David Bucheck, Technical Director of 3M's Nonwoven
Technology Centre reminded us of the importance of a continuous flow of new
products, and of the success 3M continues to have in generating such a flow.
They spend $1bn of their $17bn turnover on R&D and last year launched 500
new products. Their strategy mandates >30% of sales must originate from
products less than 4 years old. Put another way that means over $1bn new
products business every year. Key elements of achieving this goal over many
years are:
• Recruiting creative people. (Resist the temptation to
hire the experienced: recruit the best new college graduates at a designated
rate regardless of the economic climate)
• Demanding market-driven customer-led innovation. (Get into the customers back-room and seek unarticulated needs) • Encouraging strong inter-R&D group communications. (Technology belongs to the company, not the individual. “The more networking and sharing we do the better our odds for success”) • Creating an atmosphere that rewards initiative and is never destructively critical of mistakes • Allowing everyone to spend one day a week on their own pet project – if they want to. This is the most important factor in establishing a culture of innovation. • Formally rewarding success with Honours and Awards.
For long-time 3m watchers, one recent change of approach
was apparent. In response to a question, Mr Bucheck commented that they were now
looking at licensing technologies they were not using. In the past the
importance they attached to serendipitous development meant that even unused
technologies would be kept “visible” and never, never, sold.
Disinfecting Wipes
Richard Porticos of the Chlorox Company reviewed the
history of antimicrobial wet-wipes from their unsuccessful introduction in the
80's (“products that overpromised and underdelivered”) to their re-emergence
based on better substrates at a time when a higher premium could be placed on
their convenience and ease of use. The category now provided excellent returns,
said to be $135million at retail, using $20million of nonwovens amounting to 125
million square yards in 2001. (Projections for 2005 were $175m at retail or
165million sq. yds.) Chlorox now involve their substrate supplier in Focus Group
discussions because the feel of the wipe has proved to be at least as important
as its functionality, and suppliers need to hear this direct from consumers. Mr
Porticos underlined the importance of new substrates to sustaining the growth in
the wet-wipe sector.
• The jury is still out on the subject of antibiotic
resistant organisms arising from the widespread use of antimicrobials
• Air-laid and spunlaced fabric technologies were converging to the extent that either could now be used, even in canisters. • Mr Clean Wipe-Ups nevertheless used air-laid in the tubs and refills, but spun-laced in the canisters. • Lysol Sanitized used spun-lace only. Patent Strategy
Richard Jenkins of Jenkins and Wilson P.A. defined
intellectual property as ideas, expressions of ideas, corporate image, processes
products and machines, consumer goodwill, ways of doing business, computer
programmes and more. The laws of patents, trademarks, copyright and trade
secrets protect such property.
Patents protect ideas. (Anything under the sun that is
made by man can be patented ( Diamond v. Chakrabaty ), and the converse
is also true - nothing occurring in nature including the natural laws that are
used to describe nature, can be patented.) Copyright protects the expression of
ideas, trademarks protect distinctive goods and services and the Uniform Trade
Secrets Act protects trade secrets.
• In practice an invention must be useful, novel and
non-obvious to obtain a patent. Establishing non-obviousness is the source of
most debate – and patent agents fees.
• You can patent products, processes, methods and machinery. Product patents, being most easily policed, give the best protection. • Patents give you a 20 year legal monopoly from the filing date – but it usually takes 2-3 years to prosecute the patent leaving ~17 years for exploitation. • Patents are “Pending” during this prosecution stage, and while not enforceable, this does deter the competition from copying. • Since 1995 in the USA , it has been possible to file working manuscripts as Provisional Patents to get an early filing date, moving to a full patent one year later if all is working well. This extends the patent's useful life by 1 year. • Since November 29 th 2000, patents are published 18months after filing unless you can make a case for non-publication – usually only possible if there will be no subsequent foreign filings. • Foreign patents can be filed up to one year after US publication. • Filing a PCT patent for $3-4000 gives “world patent pending” coverage for 30 months. Country-specific patents can then be filed at ~$5000 per country. • Patents do not necessarily give you the right to practice your own invention. There could be a dominant patent which you would need to licence first. • If your patent is an improvement which interests the owner of the dominant patent, then cross-licensing becomes possible. • Patents can be used to stop imports of allegedly infringing goods. The so-called “rocket-docket” can hold imports in the port until a decision is reached. • A re-examination procedure now allows a valid patent to be challenged for only $10,000 to $20,000 • Design Patents are possible and these have a 14 year term. USPTO woes
Esther Kepplinger, Deputy Commissioner for Patent
Operations at the United States Patent and Trademark Office provided some
insight into the problems created by the disruption to postal services caused by
Sept 11 th and Anthrax. Delayed mail and mail disintegrating following
irradiation has reduced patent filings to 85% of the expected level. This
amounts to 8600 patents below target since 9.11 despite a huge increase in faxes
(45,000 pages in December c.f. 8,000 in September). However since the American
Inventors Protection Act (1999) the patent term can be adjusted to compensate if
the USPTO takes too long to process the application. Applications filed in the
US on or after 29 th November 2000 are now published 18 months from the earliest
filing date unless the inventor declares that foreign patents won't follow.
Applications filed on or after June 8 th 1995 can now be re-examined. Patent
filing directly on the Internet will be encouraged at www.uspto.gov.
Intellectual Property Management
Deborah Lickfield of Lickfield Consulting LLC covered
similar territory to the preceding two speakers. New information:
• Patents can be invalidated if the inventor list is incomplete. She cited a case where an excluded inventor joined another company and was legally able to grant a licence without reference to his previous employer. • Technical Disclosures are increasingly used to stop others patenting technology you are not interested in commercialising. • Since Jan 1 st 1996, you can infringe a product patent merely by offering to sell a similar product, e.g. in a telephone call to a potential buyer. • You can lose your right to patent by offering samples without the cover of a confidentiality agreement. However the use of samples in a Focus Group would not be a problem providing the samples were retained by the inventor.
Inventors of new materials faced some really tricky
problems arising from their customers right to patent new end-uses, thereby
restricting the suppliers ability to sell the new material. The supplier could
of course take out application patents where new uses could be foreseen, but
this tended to aggravate potential customers even if free-licences were
promised. Pre-sampling agreements to the effect that any new applications
discovered in the course of evaluating the new material were to be owned jointly
by customer and supplier were one possibility, but many customers were reluctant
to agree to this. Perhaps the best approach for the supplier was to brainstorm
all possible applications and make a technical disclosure to prevent anyone
cornering the market for new applications.
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Thursday, 1 November 2001
Insight 2001: Orlando 22nd-25th October
Introduction
Walt Disney World in general and the
on-site Hilton Hotel in particular were unusually quiet in the aftermath of
September 11th. Nevertheless some 450 delegates enjoyed this major event in the
annual nonwoven calender, about 220 fewer than had gathered a year ago for the
Toronto Insight 2000. According to conference organiser Jim Hanson of Marketing
Technology Service Inc., registrations for Orlando had been set to equal or beat
the Toronto record up to “911” but after the tragedy, new registrations and
cancellations had been roughly equal.
Hygiene Industry is Changing
Pricie Hanna, VP of John Starr Inc
reviewed the effects of major acquisitions, internal expansions and new market
entrants on the disposables market and its supply chain.
- Wal-mart’s acquisitions of Woolco in Canada, ASDA in the UK, Cifra in Mexico, Wertkauf and Spar Handels in Germany, along with their expansions into Brazil, Argentina, Puerto Rico, China and South Korea were increasing the competitive intensity. (Their “everyday low price” philosophy was spreading.)
- In 1994 the $738 million sales of private label diapers went 61% through food stores and 28% through mass merchandisers. Last year the $756 million sales were 39% through food stores and 52% through mass merchandisers. (Drug stores account for the remainder.)
- Wal-Mart’s “White Cloud” diapers gained share rapidly being better value than P&G Luvs®
- Between 1995 and 2000 P&G has fallen from 36% to 34% global market share of diapers and training pants. The biggest percentage loss was in Latin America (39% to 23%). Their strategy is to expand premium product globally, to hold the category leadership in core brands e.g. Luvs with cloth-like backsheets, and to rely more on suppliers for new developments.
- Over the same period, KC grew from 19% to 28% of the global market, with the biggest gains in Western Europe (4% to 19%) and Latin America (23% to 32%). Their strategy is to grow by acquisition (e.g. Linostar in Italy, Mimo in Chile, SK in Taiwan).
- Paragon, Ontex, SCA, and Kendall-Confab are capitalising on the growth of store brands, Paragon by adding new capacity and Ontex by numerous acquisitions.
- SCA has acquired J&J’s Serenity® (inco-pads), and Hartmann has acquired Vlesia® from DSG. DSG has acquired Drypers. Unicharm and Kao are consolidating.
- In China, Hengen International is investing in new femcare and diaper lines and has imported a new incontinence product line.
- Other local producers to watch: Everbeauty and FuBurg in Taiwan, CMPC in South America, and Grupo P.I. Mabe in Mexico, South America and Spain.
Among the suppliers
- Avgol has acquired Unifi
- BBA and PGI are rationalising
- BBA and First Quality are installing new coverstock lines.
- Elastic composites are emerging from KC, Clopay, Tredegar, BBA, Dupont.
- Superabsorbent foams are emerging from BASF, Freudenberg and P&G?
- Fluff pulp producers are focussing on air-lay expansions
In response to questions, Ms Hanna felt
that
- In a recession, hygienic product consumption is unlikely to fall, but cheaper products would gain share and penetration of new markets would be more difficult.
- Store brands would do particularly well.
- Raw material prices would stabilise.
- Could the necessary R&D be afforded? It had to be well focussed, and if suppliers were to contribute to innovation, they had to be given more information. (Still too much secrecy)
- Suppliers are indicating that new product developments are not being taken up as quickly as converters had promised.
- Air-laid diaper cores are still a couple of years from reality, but the price gap is closing. They could be specified for new diaper line installations where capital costs could be reduced by the adoption of air-laid.
- Apart from some regional issues, SAP supply and demand is likely to be in balance for the next 3 years.
- There is no sign of a successful interlabial pad from P&G.
- Market analysts holding CEO’s of public companies accountable for short-term growth would give the small private companies the edge in the longer term.
Nonwovens in Hygiene Absorbents
Linda Kelly , who joined the Starr
consultancy this year after managing a business group at BBA Nonwovens,
presented John Starr’s paper.
- Nonwoven industry revenues had grown from $3 billion in 1980 to $10 billion in 2000 and were expected to reach $18 billion by 2010.
- Revenues from the top 10 producers of nonwovens had risen from $3 billion in 1990 to $5 billion in 2000 and would reach $10 billion by 2010.
- EBIT (Earnings before interest and taxation) as a percentage of revenue, while static over the last 20 years would rise from about 13% to 15% for the industry as a whole and from about 14% to 18% for the top 10 nonwoven producers.
- The hygiene market now consumed 3 to 3.5 million tonnes of pulp, 1.2 million tonnes of superabsorbents and 0.5 million tonnes of barrier film.
- 40 billion square metres of nonwovens were used in combination with the above materials and a further 3.5 billion square metres in the heavier weight hygienic wipes category.
- 266 billion absorbent “pads” were used in 2000 growing to 310 billion by 2004. (Diapers accounted for 100 billion of the 2000 figure, the remainder being femcare and incontinence products)
- Retail value of the pads in 2000 was $40 billion.
- Total wipes retail value was put at $3.5 billion (86 billion units) in 2001, expected to rise to 101 billion units by 2005.
Nonwoven technologies
- 1.1 million tonnes of spunbonded PP is now produced. Some overcapacity exists and obsolete machines will be closed or modernised. However more capacity is needed for some types in some regions.
- Carded thermal bonded coverstock has lost share globally but is now replacing some apertured films in Asia based on better cost performance.
- Femcare accounts for 80% of current air-laid production. More usage can be expected in femcare and incontinence pads, with some introductions in training pants and diapers.
- Hydroentanglement capacity was estimated to be 300,000 tonnes (2000?)
Industry profitability was thought to have declined
recently due to overcapacity driving down prices, investments in new technology
and the slower than expected introduction of new products.
Future growth would arise from:
- Elastic fabrics
- Bico and microfibre fabrics
- Apertured fabrics
- Lighterweight SMMS materials
- Airlaid cores
Asked if this last list was in order of likelihood, Ms
Kelly said it was. New product introductions had been slowed by both KC and
P&G over the last 2 years. (New capacity had been installed to produce them
but the expected take-up has not occurred.)
Technology Trends in Personal Care Products
Sorin Crainic, Product Development Group Manager
with PGI Nonwovens described a global study of personal care products.
This involved categorising the products, noting the main claims made for them,
the properties yielding the claims, the technologies used to deliver these
properties, and hence the trends in the use of these technologies.
In Hand & Body Wipes:
- Cellulosic fibres were needed to retain lotion or remove moisture from the skin, whereas the synthetics improved bulk and assisted lotion release.
- Air-laid technology dominated the US scene, but card/spunlace dominated in Europe and the Far East. Wet-laid is used for economy products.
- Specialities include antimicrobials, skin care agents (vitamin E, Aloe)
- Flushability is in demand, but true nonwoven flushability (as opposed to tissue or flushability by virtue of small size) has yet to appear.
In facial cleansing, moisturising and make-up
removal wipes:
- Rayon and cotton were needed for softness, woodpulp for exfoliation.
- Card/spunlace dominates for softness and lint-free properties
- Embossing or 3D aperturing (Miratech®) provide the structure for exfoliation, while lamination to harsher (woodpulp) products provide the abrasion.
In facial treatment wipes:
- Synthetics (esp polyester) provides strength and lotion release; rayon or cotton provide softness.
- Card/spunlace again dominates but card/thermal (using rayon and PP) technologies can be found.
- Polyester spunbond is used in nose-strips
- PP film is used to absorb skin-oil (J&J’s “Clean and Clear”)
In response to questions, Ms Crainic observed that:
- The baby wipes market is approaching saturation and will peak by 2005-2007.
- Lotion application, especially sun-tan lotions, are a growth area.
- Flush-by-size disposal is likely to be stopped by the authorities: sewers are blocking slowly due to accumulating nonwoven hang-ups. (Wet-toilet tissues were less of a problem.)
- Baby care wipes now dominated the personal care sector, but in future all the other personal care wipes combined would provide a market equivalent to baby-care.
- The next new technology: developing more complete lotion-release.
- Most patents were now on flushability, but inventions relating to interactions between nonwoven and lotion were now appearing.
Hydroentanglement Update
Phillipe Coppin (Consultant) updated
his Insight 1998 paper and provided a detailed analysis of the publicly
available information:
- Global production in 2000 was estimated to be 246,000 tonnes excluding pilot lines, cosmetic pads and “textile” lines (PGI’s Apex®, Freudenbergs Evolon®)
- By the end of 2002, output from an additional 22 new lines will be added, and some output will be lost from the closure of old lines.
- Once again the new lines are mainly destined for the European area with Orlandi, Technofibra, Jacob Holm, Tenotex, Freudenberg, Novita, Spuntech, and 5 undisclosed Fleissner lines being mentioned. (includes Turkey, Israel and Egypt)
- New US installations will be at BBA, Dupont and Ahlstrom.
- New Asian installations will be at Daiwabo, Unitika, Nisshinbo, and Baiksan.
- In Mexico, Polymeros y Derivados are adding a second line.
- In South America Uniminas, Ober, Dupont/Cipatex and K-C Columbia were mentioned.
The growth of the technology has been fuelled by an
explosion of wipes offerings following the successes of P&G’s baby wipes and
Swiffer® products. New lower-cost, higher quality systems from both Perfojet and
Fleissner have contributed to the early obsolescence of the older machines. The
large impregnated wipe market is still dominated by air-laid but could turn to
spunlace if one of the majors decides that such fabric would confer a marketing
advantage.
Roll-goods prices of spunlace (summer 2001)
ranged from:
- 11-12 c/yd 2 for a 55gsm 50/50 rayon/pulp wipe material, through
- 14-15 c/yd 2 for the 70/30 rayon/PET version
- to 22-30 c/yd 2 for 80/20 rayon/PET at 68-80 gsm for a food service wipe.
- Swiffer® fabric, a 68gsm carded PET/PP Scrim sandwich was 20-22 c/yd 2.
- Surgical barrier, the hydrophobic 68gsm 45%/55% PET/woodpulp material, was selling at 30-40 c/yd 2
- For comparison, 100% latex-bonded air-laid pulp wipe fabric cost 10-11 c/yd 2.
Capital Costs for a 3.5m card/hydro line
running at up to 170m/min were estimated to be $7.7-9.0M with an additional
$4-5M being needed if an airlaying option was required. Production of
card/spunlaid composites (e.g. for Swiffer®-type dry wipes) would require an
additional $6M for the spunlaid PP extrusion equipment. (Both the airlaid and
spunlaid options were costed at 200m/min.)
In the textile market, both PGI’s Miratech® and
Freudenberg’s Evolon® were having difficulty selling against woven products and
were adding little to the overall growth as yet. Miratech® was selling into
garden furniture covers at K-Mart while Evolon® had some success in reusable
wipes. BBA had licenced their Interspun® hydroenhancement system (for bulking up
woven fabrics or stabilising knits) to CULP Inc. for upholstery and ticking
uses. Fleissner, under an exclusive agreement with BBA on this technology
(Aquatex®) had installed the 2.5m CULP line.
One “novelty” mentioned: the patent issued to Paul
Zlatkus in June 2000 covering the production of elastic fabrics by
hydroentanglement of woodpulp into a pre-stretched foam.
Air-Laid: The next wave
John Conley (Consultant: formerly founder and
CEO of Airformed Composites and President of Walkisoft) reviewed the
potential of air-laid nonwovens:
In diaper cores he saw air-laid providing
improved performance and comfort in use while having the capability to reduce
conversion costs through higher productivity on simpler diaper lines. There was
a 1.8 million tonne/year potential market here but to realise it costs had to be
further reduced to persuade diaper makers to convert and install machinery to
handle it. Festooning systems to handle the cores appeared to be a commercial
reality but again, further improvements were needed.
In wet toilet tissue, the latest products from
P&G and KC were in fact successors to Playtex “ Better Way” (tissue -
‘70’s), American Can “Fresh’n” (air-laid – ‘70’s) and P&G’s “Certain”
(tissue - ‘80’s). The main lesson from these early failures was that a massive
marketing spend was needed to persuade consumers to try and then regularly
repeat-buy the product. Mr Conley nevertheless predicted a 45-70,000 tonne
market for air-laid in this category by 2007.
Impregnated wipes were an $835M market in the
US and Canada in 2000 and could be expected to reach $1.5B by 2005 due to
globalisation of the US products and many new applications being developed (dry
shampoo towels mentioned).
In packaging he expects the air-laid tonnage to
reach 300,000 per year by 2010. The products involved:
- Meat and poultry pads
- Repulpable boxes with soft interiors
- Dessicant wraps for electronics and pharmaceuticals
- Blood transport absorbent packs
- Biocidal biohazard and medical waste packs.
- Controlled release carriers for high-value produce.
Other applications expected to grow were:
- Trans-dermal patches and wraps
- Graduated filters (porosity gradient)
- Water dispersible film-airlaid laminates
- Spunbond/airlaid/Spunbond laminates that can be split to yield two soft and durable sheets. (Garment labels?)
- High modulus fibre air-laids for reinforced composites.
- Heating/cooling pads and wraps.
- Carbon/glass airlaids with special binders for “warm” fuel-cell stack plates (50,000 tonne mid-term potential!)
Mr Conley observed that the original American Can
“dry-papermaking” air lay machine reached 1350 ft/min compared with the 550
ft/min achieved after 25 years of development on the current M&J and Danweb
systems. Higher speeds coupled with waste reduction and the ability to use
low-cost reclaimed fibre buried in the centre would finally get air-laid costs
to an acceptable level.
In response to questions, air-lay diaper cores were now
going commercial, but he was not at liberty to say who was doing it. Why not use
tubs (as in Europe) for wet toilet tissue? To minimise the change of habit c.f.
dry tissue. However wet tissue was expected to be incremental volume over dry,
and not a replacement for it.
Air-Laid to replace carding?
Jesper Dobel, General Manager of Dan-Webforming
International ( Denmark) described initial trials with a new forming
head said to be capable of laying up to 40mm fibres and competing with carding
and crossfolding. His goal was to engineer a technology that could be integrated
with either Dan-Web or M&J lines feeding spunlace bonders and which could
produce webs with equal MD and CD properties from 100% man-made fibres.
Problems with the fibre feeders/openers which had yet to
be adapted for the longer fibres meant that results to date were from 6, 8, 12
and 24mm (maximum), and a video showed 18mm fibre running at ~10 m/min from ~12”
wide head, the internal details of which were not revealed. Photos of the webs
indicated that while 12mm looked excellent, 18mm was borderline and 24mm, while
being a remarkably good web for an air-layer, was not up to carding standards.
- Today’s pulp-forming speeds were said to be 400m/min, with 800m/min expected by 2005. (Throughput was expected to rise from 400 to 600 kg/hr/m in the same period)
- The new head allowed 85% of peak (pulp) productivity with 18mm fibre compared with only 5% on the current Dan-Web formers. 80% was achievable with 24mms, a length which would not run at all on the old machines.
- The fibres tested were 2.2dtex Trevira polyester with “slight” crimp.
- Line speeds possible on the 18mm were low at around 25m/min at present. 200m/min was felt to be achievable.
- Throughputs were 150 kg/hr/m but doublel this ought to be achievable.
- The new head was patented in August and could be commercially available by next Autumn.
- They hoped to install a head on one of their 600mm pilot lines next.
Air forming Flax and Hemp
Bodil Engberg Pallesen of the Danish
Agricultural Advisory Centre and Marianne Eriksen, a consultant,
described a new air forming unit capable of processing flax and hemp into thick
insulation “slabs” to compete with glass and mineral wool building insulation.
Although the internal details were not revealed the forming head was not unlike
a Dan Web machine without the cylindrical screens.
- The 60 cm wide line would convert 600kg/hr of a flax/bico mixture (95/5) to make a thermally bonded wadding up to 20cm thick.
- This was water-jet cut into 60x90cm blocks for packaging.
- For building insulation, flame retardency will be achieved by adding 4-8% of sodium silicate, but this cannot be done on the current line.
Other applications envisaged are:
- Pipe Insulation
- Growth media (Peat can be air-formed)
- Geotextiles
- Composites – these would use up to 50% of the bico fibre and be compressed.
Costs are about half the costs of other European hemp
and flax products because other processes use cards and require more binder.
Fluff-Pulp Evolution
Marsha Seekins, Commercial Services Director of
Georgia PacificCorporation reminded us that fluff-pulp once provided
absorbency in diapers, but is now a fluid-distribution system for superabsorbent
powders. Had superabsorbents not penetrated the diaper market, diapers would
have needed 6 million tonnes/annum of fluff by now. In reality the 3.33 million
tonne total market was split as follows in 1999:
- Diapers:1.635 million tonnes
- Femcare: 0.796 million tonnes
- Adult Incontinence: 0.654 million tonnes
- Air-laying: 0.247 million tonnes
North America and Western Europe are the big users with
25% each, China and Eastern Europe combined amount to 23%, Latin America uses 8%
and the Middle East 5%.
Of the product sectors, only AI (6% pa) and Airlay (8.5%
pa) showed reasonable growth. Nevertheless GP’s projections indicated that a
further 500,000 tonnes of fluff capacity would be needed by 2004. As it happens,
GP have a 1.3 million tonne fluff capability, of which 0.8 is currently making
for the fluff sector. The Brunswick plant is in the process of switching 100,000
tonnes of bleached board capacity to fluff. (60,000 have already been converted
and the rest follows next year.) They now see fluff as a speciality product
rather than a commodity and are concentrating on “flawless execution of the
basics” while building relationships with, and providing exceptional quality and
service to, customers. In response to questions Ms Seekins said:
- Loblolly Pine is better for fluff, eucalyptus is better for tissue. (Coastal Slash is another excellent wood for fluff.)
- Hardwoods are hardly used for fluff.
- They are beginning to see some separation of fluff and market pulp pricing.
- SAP’s will always need something to distribute fluid: pulp is best
- The most common technical service issue is defibration, hence the development of debonders.
Finishes for Fluff
Craig Poffenberger a Senior Scientist with the
Goldschmidt Chemical Corporation introduced Arosurf® PA777 and Z-Quat®
at last year’s Insight conference. Since then, the PA777 has been tested by pulp
producers and generated a wide range of results. It has now been reformulated to
better balance absorbency/ease of defibration/strength loss by the addition of a
hydrophilic compatible with the imidazolinium. Mr Poffenberger concludes that
debonders need to optimised for each type of pulp to get the maximum vertical
wicking performance. The new blend is now commercial, but there is no data on
how it’s properties changed with time after application.
Z-Quat® remains at the developmental stage and
“continues to wind its way through the regulatory registration labyrinth.”
Another Bio-Based Fibre?
Ray Miller, Technical and Business Manager of
Dupont Bio-Based Materials described Dupont’s biotechnology strategy
and their commitment to earning 25% of revenue from businesses not needing
depletable raw materials by 2010. Furthermore, in the same year they expect to
derive 10% of all energy needs from renewable resources. The introduction of
Sorona™ fibre, based on PDO (1,3 propanediol - currently derived from propylene)
and terephthalic acid was part of this strategy because they were planning to
switch to bacterially-derived PDO in the near future.
In nature, a yeast converts sugar to glycerol, which can
then be metabolised by a bacteria into PDO. In partnership with Genencor and
Tate & Lyle, Dupont has developed a single bacterium to do both steps and is
now starting up a pilot line to make 100,000 lbs/year of PDO by this method. The
decision on whether or not to switch Sorona™ from the propylene-based to the
corn-based PDO will be taken next year.
Recapping on the properties of the Sorona™ fibre, which
can be regarded as filling the gap between elastomers and hard fibres like
polyester:
- Elastic with good stretch recovery
- Very soft handle
- Easily printable and atmospherically dyeable
- Radiation sterilisable
- Inherently stain and UV resistant
- Meets Class 1 Flammability standard
The fibre will initially cost about 50% more than
polyester, but is expected to come down to a 10-15c/lb premium over polyester as
volumes increase. Existing polyester production plant can be retrofitted to
enable Sorona™ production if need be.
Polymerising the PDO with monomers other than TPA can
make other fibre types, including a true thermoplastic elastomer. In fact the
current Sorona™ fibre carries the designation 3GT, the range of fibre
possibilities being indicated by the 3G”X” suffix. A toughened polymer for
speciality resins is also under development.
Biodegradable Polyester
Bill Haile, a Research Associate with Eastman
Chemical Co. updated the information on the Eastar Bio® copolyester
derived from PTAT ( a poly tetramethylene adipate-co-terephthalate made from
adipic acid, terephthalic acid and butanediol). The polymer can be melt-spun
into binder fibres and nonwovens, the fibres being capable of forming strong
elastic bonds with cellulosics and other polyesters.
6 denier unicomponent fibres have been spun at 1500
m/min from an extruder at 160-170 oC. They are hard to card due to their
elasticity and bicomponent versions with a PTAT skin on a PP core is likely to
be the better option for staple nonwovens. Bicomponent fibres with a
biodegradable core such as PLA are under development.
Results from trials at TANDEC using 50% and 30% of the
PTAT/PP bico to bond cotton were presented. 5% to 20% of the unicomponent fibre
has also been blended with flax, needled and static hot-pressed into flexible
sheets. Similar blends of short-cut unicomponent fibre with woodpulp in
papermaking demonstrate improved wet-strength after calendering, 10% fibre
addition giving a 50% wet-strength boost.
PTAT fibre biodegradation rates compare favourably with
Kraft paper in most tests.
The polymer is already commercial in film products, and
spunbond nonwovens using it are expected to appear next year. Eastman will
concentrate on polymer sales and will not produce either fibres or nonwovens.
Hollow victory
Mabrouk Ouederni an Engineer with KoSa
provided data to illustrate how polyester could give improved fluid management
in air-laid nonwovens. He had tested 10% to 40% of 6mm polyester with solid and
hollow sections, in deniers from 3 to 15, in blend with 48% to 70% of a standard
fluffpulp, all samples being thermally bonded with 12% of Kosa T255 PE/PET
sheath/core bico fibre. The conclusions:
- Crimp level and fibre finish has a significant effect on throughput. A 25% throughput benefit can be obtained by optimising these parameters at a 10% PET addition level.
- Hollow fibres give ~25% higher throughputs than solid fibres.
- At 6mm, the denier had little effect on througput.
- Web thickness increased from about 0.5 to about 0.8cms under a 25lb load when polyester was added. Under no load there was no thickness change. Hollow fibres gave more bulk still.
- 10% polyester improved recovery from compression, increasing total free absorbency from 76 to 86 gms.
- Acquisition rates increased from 2ml/sec to 3 ml/sec for solid PET, and on to 7ml/sec with hollow fibre addition.
- In a leakage overflow test the hollow fibre allowed a 7 ml/sec insult rate without overflow.
- Wet strength of the air-laid increased from 40 to 60gms with 10% PET addition.
In answers to questions, hydrophobic finishes can be
used on the PET; there was no data on cost benefit of PET additions, and no data
on static issues with hollow polyester.
Real Nanofibres
Jayesh Doshi, President of eSpin
Technologies defined nanofibres as having a diameter less than 100
nanometres and described his work on making such fibres for filtration
applications by electrostatic spinning. Nylon polymer from Dupont, dissolved in
formic acid and contained in a hypodermic-like syringe had a high voltage
applied to the needle. As this voltage discharged through air to the earthed
conveyor, it pulled a jet of solution from the capilliary tip. This jet became
unstable, fragmenting into many fine filaments (forked lightning?) as the
solvent evaporated prior to grounding on the conveyor. Filaments with diameters
in the range from 22 to 122 nanometers were obtained in web form on the
conveyor.
Selected results from some of the trials to date were
presented. When 17 gsm of nanofibre webs were combined with conventional PP
spunbond (20 micron diameter fibres at 20-40 gsm) they:
- reduced air permeability from 350 to 1 cfm.
- Increased hydrostatic head from 6 to 8 mbar
- Increased fabric thickness from 0.36 to 0.54 mms
- Increased filtration efficiency from 28% 99% (0.1 micron NaCl aerosol)
When 8gsm of nanofibre webs were combined with
conventional PP meltblown (2-5 micron fibres at 94gsm) they:
- Reduced air permeability from 49 to 2 cfm
- Increased oil absorbency from 1450 to 1690%
- Increased fabric thickness from 0.91 to 0.96mm.
- Increased filtration efficiency from 40% to 96%.
There were numerous technical challenges to be
addressed:
- Health hazards related to solvent vapour and fibre particle inhalation.
- Fire and explosion risks due to high voltage and sparks
- Packing, shipping and handling issues
In response to questions Mr Doshi said he was in the
process of getting financing from Silicon Valley for a larger scale plant
capable of making 500-1000yd rolls or between 30 and 50 gms per day of product.
A 100gm sample of the <100nm nylon would cost several thousand dollars.
Comfort of Protective Apparel
James Zeigler, a Research Associate with
Dupont described studies where volunteers clad in various commercial
protective nonwoven suits walked on an inclined treadmill at gradually
increasing speed while heart rate, metabolic rate, skin and core body
temperatures were monitored. The test was stopped when the core body temperature
rose sharply (the onset of heat stress) and treadmill speed was recorded. This
was assumed to be the highest work rate possible in the garment under test, i.e.
the work rate where the garment is unable to dissipate the body heat being
generated. Plots of Moisture Vapour Transmission Rates (MVTR) for the fabrics
against the treadmill speed failed to show any correlation, but air permeability
and treadmill speed were directly related.
Dr Zeigler concluded that the widely accepted
relationship between “static” MVTR and thermal comfort could only be valid for a
narrow range of fabric types with similar air-permeabilities. In the real world,
body movement increases air-flow through the more permeable fabrics, overriding
MVTR effects.
Condensation of moisture on the inner surface of the
garment will also affect its performance in dynamic testing. Fabrics which can
absorb condensation on the inside and evaporate it from the outside give better
heat transfer than non-absorbent fabrics of similar construction.
PAN-Based SAP’s
Dr Pierre Vanhoorne of Bayer made a
case for using polyacrylonitrile (PAN) rather than acrylic acid (AA) for
producing superabsorbents.
- High purity glacial AA dimerises on storage so SAP plants need to be located on an AA production site.
- Acrylonitrile is in comparison a cheap commodity with supply exceeding demand and 12 major producers capable of shipping it around the world. 5.4 million tonnes are produced annually.
- Both AA and PAN are made from propene, but a new process will enable the PAN to be made from the cheaper propane.
- Bayer has sold their PAN fibre production to an Italian company, but has developed a new emulsion polymerisation process based on a polymeric surfactant, which is now being offered for licence.
There are two processes. In the first, PAN is hydrolysed
with caustic soda in ethanol and neutralised with formic acid. In the second,
newer “LIST” process, a high viscosity reactor allowed hydrolysis with aqueous
NaOH. The resulting sodium polyacrylate has a soft “cauliflower” like structure
unlike the glassy product from the AA process. This structure gives very high
absorbency under load, extremely rapid liquid uptake and low rewet values
compared with AA SAPs. (SAP properties were said to be the same from either
process.)
- Mannequin test confirm an advantage in higher absorbency before leakage.
- Costs of the ethanol process from propene via PAN were 46c/lb c.f 47.5 c/lb via the AA monomer. However the new Bayer aqueous “List” process would reduce this to 39 c/lb.
- Less than 0.1ppm of monomer was detectable in the SAP, and acrylamide was undetectable (at 1 ppm sensitivity). There were 5% water extractables and no negatives in ecotoxicity testing.
- Bayer will not operate either process themselves for strategic reasons and offer the technology on yet2.com.
- The new process is operating on a 100lbs (batch?) scale.
Asked about respirable dust, Dr Vanhoorne said this has
not yet been tested, but would be expected to be at lower levels than from the
more brittle conventional SAPs. Consumer testing remained to be carried out.
New uses for Superabsorbent
Gerd Jonas, Managing Director of Stockhausen
Inc introduced Degussa Firesorb™, an aqueous fire-fighting
concentrate comprising 28% SAP, 23% oil (biodegradable) and 6% surfactant. When
metered into water hosed onto a conflagration it:
- Adheres to vertical surfaces
- Excludes oxygen
- Absorbs heat
- Reduces run-off and collateral water damage
The concentrate is a water-in-oil emulsion which on
dilution (0.42% SAP in the water emerging from the hose was quoted) inverts to
an oil-in-water emulsion thereby releasing the SAP, allowing it to absorb and
viscosify the water. This viscous fluid is non-Newtonian and under the shear
forces in pumping and hosing presents little resistance. At higher
concentrations the thickened water can be used to coat flammable materials in
the vicinity of a fire: Firesorb™-protected plastic being shown to survive 45
minutes at 900 oC before ignition. Applications developed so far:
- Fire breaks in forest fire management
- Tyre fires
- Plastics (“solid petrol”) fires
Asked about the disposal of the treated water, Mr Jonas
said it could be washed off easily and was safe in the municiple waste water
stream. It had been sprayed onto firefighters to keep them cool while fighting
forest fires in Spain. With regard to breakdown into monomers under heat Mr
Jonas had no information, but commented that no “poisonous gases” were released.
The main hazard appeared to be that it made floors very slippy.
Elastic Nonwovens
Jared Austin, a Research Fellow with BBA
Nonwovens provided a most comprehensive review routes to elasticity in
nonwovens in the light of a belief that elasticity is a vital ingredient in the
quest for ever more textile-like nonwovens.
Elastomers could be thermoplastic or non-thermoplastic,
the latter being the traditional spandex or natural rubber products. The
thermoplastic kind could be moisture sensitive (condensation polymers such as
polyurethanes, polyetheresters and polyetheramides) or moisture insensitive
(polyolefins and polystyrenes) Polyolefins were the cheapest of the
thermoplastics (~$0.9/lb) but had worst stress-relaxation properties; styrenics
($1.20/lb) were better, with the polyetheresters ($3.50/lb) outperforming these
and the polyurethanes ($3.00/lb). Very high molecular weights were needed to get
the best stress-relaxation performance. (e.g. Kraton®: USP 4720415)
Because elastomers tended to be “sticky” and uncardable,
they always had to be used in composite form for acceptable processing and
comfort. Such composites had to be formed with the elastic in a pre-stretched
state unless the non-elastic component could be engineered to allow stretch to
occur. Pre-stretched laminates were described in USP 3,575,782; WO 99/17926; and
USP 4,720,415. Examples of high-stretch non-elastics for laminating with
elastics were parallel laid card-webs with high CD direction elongation – as
used in BBA’s Sofspan® hydroentangled product and Ultramesh® calender bonded
laminate.
Other products mentioned were:
- TANDEC’s process for drawing down and resetting a spunbond or meltblown to give a narrow fabric with very high CD elasticity,
- P&G’s “Ring-Rolling” process,
- Laminates with elastic nets (WO 00/44556),
- Breathable barriers based on microporous elastics,
- Elastic bicomponent fibres from Hills Inc., where the 10% non-elastic sheath buckled to give a fascinating creped skin on a 6 denier filament.
- Cross-linked thermoplastic elastomeric fibres being developed by a Dow/BBA JV.
3D Apertured Laminates
Jim Cree (Marketing Manager) and Bill Deep
(Global Product Manager) of Tredegar Film Products described how the
vacuum-perforation process used to make apertured films could be adapted to
produce laminates. Extruding the film-forming polymer onto a PP nonwoven prior
to passing the combination, film side down, around the suction drum while the
film was still plastic produced a two-layer product. A second layer of film
could then be extruded onto the “male” side of the perforated film to give an
even bulkier product without perforations. A wide variety of possible nonwovens
coupled with a wide range of possible films and several different aperturing
patterns led to an enormous array of possible end products. Those mentioned
specifically were:
- Air-laid or spunlaced nonwovens laminated to film to give a 2-surface wiping effect. (e.g. Scouring and absorbing)
- Film laminated to 13 gsm spunbond to give a diaper backsheet.
- Elastic laminates for waistbands, side panels and medical bandages.
- Ostomy bag covers
- Automobile headliner by laminating film to chopped glass strand to PU foam.
In response to questions, USP 06303208 dated 10/16/01
was mentioned. The process would run in a 30 to 250 m/min range. It cost 20-30%
less than glue lamination
Alternative Energy: Fuel Cells
Dr John McCulloch (Consultant) took us
through the development of the fuel cell from its invention in 1839 by Sir
William Grove (a Welshman), its use by NASA to provide water and energy in the
1960’s, to today’s specialist uses in over 250 systems in 15 countries.
Fuel-cell use is expected to grow both in special
applications and as a result of the Exxon/General Motors collaboration to
demonstrate their uses in automobiles. The way forward involves reducing their
costs (cheaper, lighter materials), increasing their efficiency and developing
cheaper sources of hydrogen. Opportunities for nonwovens appear to be related to
the polymer electrolyte membrane cell currently favoured for automotive
applications, and were listed as follows:
- Carbon and/or fluorine membranes
- Filters in ancilliary equipment
- Microporous carbon nonwovens as a gas-diffusion layer (Lydall)
- Nonwoven catalyst carriers (Technical Fibre Products)
Incontinence Survey Data
Nancy Muller, Executive Director of the National
Association for Continence presented the highlights from two nationwide
surveys, one involving intercepting the general public in shopping malls, the
other being telephone survey of NAFC members. Both studies confirmed findings
from an earlier smaller study:
- The majority of citizens remain ignorant of bladder health issues
- 66% have never spoken to a doctor or nurse about bladder health.
- Half of those reporting symptoms of incontinence have never consulted a doctor.
- Women are less likely than men to seek help. 68% of women with a problem tolerate their symptoms as they gradually get worse, whereas half the men who suffered report the problem immediately.
- 25 million Americans are affected by incontinence now. The figure will be 30 million by 2020
- One-in-five suffer in their forties, and one-in-three suffer in their sixties.
In response to a question, Ms Muller said that skin
health problems associated with incontinence were a greater issue for men than
women.
Antimicrobials for odour control
Lisa Baker, a Senior Development Scientist with
PGI presented the results of panel tests designed to show the benefits
of their antimicrobial acquisition layer in controlling odours associated with
adult incontinence. She characterised the odour problem:
- Dominated by ammonia arising from the breakdown of urea by urease secreted by bacteria.
- The human nose can detect 50ppm of ammonia.
- Faecal odours are a minor problem in comparison.
- Masking the ammonia smell is impossible,
- Absorbing it with zeolites works, but is expensive
- Eliminating it by killing the bacteria was the solution preferred by PGI.
The acquisition layer used an antimicrobial coupled with
a pH buffer to control the pH on the acid side of the neutrality that the
bacteria prefer.
For the panel tests, sections of adult pads with treated
acquistion layers were inoculated with 100mls of synthetic urine seeded with
various cultures of micro-organisms, and stored in closed containers with and
without warming for up to 24 hours. Panelists were asked to smell the containers
at intervals and rate the smell as better than or worse than a control which
used an untreated acquisition layer.
The overall conclusion? More than 50% of the panellists
thought the treated pads smelled better.
Ms Baker thought the acquisition layer, a card/thermal
PP product could be used in diapers. The treatment chemistry was not revealed,
but it was said to be non-leaching and EPA registered. The pH? 4.3, measured on
an extract of the nonwoven. Could it be added to SAP’s or pulps where it ought
to be even more effective? Yes.
Recycling infectious medical waste
Mike McCool, Partner, Eclipse FiberNet
Corporation described the rotating autoclave (“Rotoclave”) designed to
sterilise red-bag hospital waste before shredding and disposal. The Rotoclave
has been shown to give an 8 log 10 kill of thermally stable bacterial spores. Mr
McCool thought it would be possible to recover and reuse any nonwovens in the
waste, but in reality they would be reduced to short fibres. One interesting
feature of the process was that any plastics in the refuse tended to melt and
ball-up, becoming easily separated in the discharge from the Rotoclave.
The system could, in theory, be used to treat the
municpal solid waste stream, in which case 100 million tonnes of fluff pulp
could be recovered from the paper component. Eclipse FiberNet was planning a
400-tonne/day system to investigate this.
High Speed Production
John Tharpe, President of R&L
Engineering reviewed early disposable product production methods and
the barriers to be surmounted to reach high production rates. Being an
ex-P&G’er, one of his examples was the Rely tampon process. This had reached
production rates of 650 tampons/minute after solutions had been found to the
following problems:
- Holes in the nonwoven from which the bag was made. (A laser scanning system was developed to detect holes and thin areas and this was linked to a product reject mechanism.)
- Glue deposits built up on the tube-forming mandrel while sealing the nonwoven into a tube. (Chilling the press-wheel caused condensation to form at the nip preventing the glue from sticking to the metal. Now ultrasonic bonding would be the solution.)
- In a design where the string would be invisible to the user until insertion, 100% detection of satisfactory attachment of the string to the bag was crucial. (The process was changed so that the string was used to transport finished tampons: no string, no product.)
In one case-study, replacing an old diaper machine with
a new 30% higher-productivity machine at twice the cost increased the profit but
adding a second old machine to double the output was the better, even more
profitable option.
Sonic Bonding at 1000ft/min
Joseph Neuwirth of Sonic Solutions Inc
. has developed a rotary converter and horn system capable of sonic bonding at
speeds up to 1000 ft/min where the conventional static horn runs into
difficulties at above 500ft/min. The calender-like action of the new machine
also makes it possible to bond the thick, bulky or high weight materials that
were problematic on the conventional system.
The vibrating roller is currently made up to 2 inches
wide and the system costs about twice that of the conventional type. This
increased cost arises from the complexity and tighter tolerances of the rotating
system. Applications on diaper and femcare lines are foreseen. In response to
questions, Mr Neuwirth also felt the machine could replace high speed sewing
machines and that when properly isolated, the bearings would not suffer from
extra wear due to the vibrations.
The effects of fibre entanglement
Tony Butterworth (Consultant) argued
the importance of fibre interaction at the micro-level in delivering strength,
softness, dryness, absorbency, cleansing, filtering, and the appearance and
touch of fabrics, be they woven or nonwoven. Taking wipes evolution as his main
theme he reviewed the structures of Chicopee Keybak (60’s), Scott Paper High
Loft (‘70’s), Kroyer and Honshu process airlaids and on through wet-wipes to
today’s hydroentangled products including Swiffer®.
Concluding that the surface area presented by the fabric
(typically 3-10 m 2 for every 1m 2 of materal) was crucially important, he
reminded us of that curious combination of wet-lay and air-lay, the foam
process. This was first operated by Wiggins Teape in the ‘60’s and improved by
Ahlstrom who now lay 15mm fibres from micro-foam in a twin wire former,
achieving levels of bulk and available surface area which Mr Butterworth thought
would be valuable in today’s wipes.
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