CARBON NANOTUBES FOR INNOVATIVE ECO-FRIENDLY FLAME RETARD ANT SOLUTIONS

摘要

Halogenated flame retardants are commonly used in consumer products but they have raised concerns due to their persistency, bioaccumulation on living organisms and their potential toxic effects on human health. On the other hand, harmonization of regulations and standards in European Community led to a modification of the fire retardant market. As a consequence plastic industry is requested to develop new Fire Retardant (FR) polymer solutions to foresee those modifications of regulations. In collaboration with different partners (within EU granted DEROCA project), Nanocyl has built a great know-how leading to eco-friendly alternative solutions for fire resistant thermoplastics based on carbon nanotubes. Literature has actually reported many time the effect of Carbon nanotubes as fire retardant. For example, cone calorimeter and UL-94 results showed an improved and strengthened charring effect, a drastic reduction of dripping and flame spread rate as well as synergist effect with conventional flame retardant. In the last development, novel approach using design of experiment (DoE) has been undertaken to satisfy on multifunctional performances for market-oriented solution including commodity applications. The developments using this DoE approach show clear synergism between some conventional flames retardant such as metal hydroxide or phosphorus based compound. In addition to the good flame retardant behavior, other key performances such as mechanical, electrical properties could be enhanced. Successful case studies will be shown to address those technical successes in the field of wire & cable, industrial tubes and molded parts.