Current Status and Prospects of Process Technology for Fatty Alcohol Catalytic Amination to Tertiary Amine

Market and Application Aliphatic amines with carbon chain lengths between C8 and C18 are an important class of organic chemical products and intermediates. They are widely used in petrochemical, pharmaceutical, agrochemical and surfactant manufacturing industries. At present, the annual production of fatty amines in the world is about 500,000 tons and is on the rise. Aliphatic amines are classified into three categories based on their molecular structure: primary amines, secondary amines, and tertiary amines. From the yield point of view, more than 60% are fatty tertiary amines. The primary use of tertiary amines is as a raw material for cationic or zwitterionic surfactants. It can be said that the vast majority of cationic and zwitterionic surfactants are derivatives of fatty tertiary amines. The cationic and zwitterionic surfactants have irreplaceable status and role due to their unique properties such as fabric softness, antistatic, sterilization and metal corrosion inhibition. The fatty tertiary amines generally described can be classified into long-chain alkyl dimethyl tertiary amines, double-long-chain alkyl methyl tertiary amines and tri-long alkyl tertiary amines according to their structures. The production of mono-long-chain alkyl tertiary amines in the tertiary amines was the largest, accounting for more than 60% of the total tertiary amine output, and it reached more than 80% in China, followed by double-long chain tertiary methyl tertiary amines. The production of three-long-chain alkyl tertiary amines is the smallest, but it has developed rapidly in recent years and the growth rate is higher than the other two types of tertiary amine products.

Dimethyl dodecyl tertiary amine

The main method for preparing fatty alkyl dimethyl tertiary amines is the amination reaction of fatty alcohols and dimethylamines under the action of dehydrogenation-hydrogenation catalysts, wherein the fatty alcohols are natural fatty alcohols. The catalyst uses a Cu-Ni based supported or unsupported metal oxide. In the past 20 years, the properties of Cu and Ni binary catalysts have been extensively studied and reported [2–5], and industrialization has been realized. The products are important organic chemical intermediates, and cations derived therefrom are derivatized. Zwitterionic surfactants are widely used in petrochemicals, agrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, and daily chemical industries. The authors studied the catalytic amination of C12-13 synthetic alcohols (OXOs) in order to replace the natural C12-14 alcohols commonly used in the industry, so that the tertiary amine manufacturing industry has more raw material choices. The hydroformylation (OXO) process uses Cobalt as a catalyst to react Co with H2 and olefins to produce aldehydes, which are then hydrogenated to fatty alcohols. The OXO process produces a high degree of alcohol branching, and the improved cobalt catalyzed process product contains 20%. The left and right branch isomers.