As an important inorganic chemical raw material, zinc oxide is widely used in rubber, paint, medicine, electronics and other fields, and its industry development has an important impact on the global economy and scientific and technological development. In recent years, the scale of the domestic zinc oxide market has gradually increased, and the fields involved have been increasing. However, due to the variety of zinc oxide specifications, some specifications demand has shrunk, and its industry is also facing industrial consolidation, production capacity and output have declined, and the development of the industry has gradually emerged "new ideas".
Classification and application of zinc oxide
In terms of the current classification of zinc oxide products, according to the production process can be roughly divided into three categories: indirect zinc oxide, direct zinc oxide, active (wet) zinc oxide, in different classifications, and subdivided into different specifications, content and so on. In zinc oxide, indirect zinc oxide is the mainstream zinc oxide, and its production capacity is relatively high, and its downstream field is also relatively concentrated, mostly concentrated in the rubber field. The rubber field is also one of the largest application areas of zinc oxide products, and the proportion of downstream consumption of zinc oxide can account for about 50%-60%, and in recent years, the proportion has been increasing. It is precisely because the proportion of zinc oxide in rubber applications continues to increase, which has led to the industrial integration of active zinc oxide.
The formation of "new idea" of active zinc oxide
Active zinc oxide, also known as wet zinc oxide, the name is beautiful, its production process is wet smelting, in the production process needs to carry out neutral leaching and acid leaching in the leaching agent, and finally form zinc oxide, while excluding production wastewater. Different from the indirect method and the direct method of zinc oxide calcination, the wet production process is different, and the produced products have certain differences in specific surface area, particle size and activity. It is precisely because of these differences that different types of zinc oxide are gradually applied to different fields. Such as direct zinc oxide and wet zinc oxide, will be applied to the ceramic industry, the ceramic industry is the second largest application field of zinc oxide after the rubber industry. However, due to the downturn in the real estate industry in recent years, the ceramic industry has shrunk, incomplete data statistics, a domestic ceramic production area, ceramic enterprises shrank nearly 70%, zinc oxide sales blocked. In addition to rubber, ceramics, the rest of the relatively small application areas have also appeared different degrees of shrinkage, therefore, active zinc oxide gradually to the "new idea" development.
The shift from "new thinking" to "old direction"
Active zinc oxide in the deep cultivation of the tire industry process, its advantages are also more prominent, because the active zinc oxide raw materials are mostly zinc containing materials and zinc ash, raw material prices are lower than or even far lower than the indirect method of zinc oxide raw materials, so the price of finished products is lower than the indirect method of zinc oxide, after ensuring the quality, the acceptance of downstream tire enterprises is also higher, therefore, It has become the main reason for the active zinc oxide to break the barrier. The reason for the new idea is the old direction, because the application of active zinc oxide to the tire industry can be traced back to several years ago, but in the process of continuous development of the industry, the use of low content zinc oxide has been gradually eliminated, and the application of active zinc oxide in the tire industry has been reduced. The main difficulty in the application of active zinc oxide to tires is that the problems of increasing content, particle size and activity are easier to overcome. Since then, with the further development of the active zinc oxide industry, it has improved product quality, in the context of industrial integration, some well-known domestic tire manufacturers have purchased active zinc oxide, and the application is relatively stable. However, the road to industrial integration is long, and the amount of active zinc oxide that can be sold to tire companies is still far lower than the indirect method of zinc oxide, so some active zinc oxide factories accelerated the pace of development of the tire industry this year.