Cognis Mexico opens new sulfation facility

Cognis Mexico S.A., a subsidiary of Cognis GmbH (Monheim, Germany; www.cognis.com), today opened a new sulfation plant at its site in Ecatepec, Mexico. The facility, which uses state-of-the art technology to increase the existing plant’s capacity and the quality of its products, produces ingredients for use in personal and home care products, such as shampoos and shower gels.  The new sulfation reaction unit complements the existing sulfation plants in Cognis sites in Argentina, Brazil and the U.S. It uses crystalline sulfur, which is oxidized into sulfur trioxide for performing the sulfation reaction instead of traditional chlorosulfonic acid. As a result, the produced fatty alcohol sulfates, fatty alcohol ether sulfates and other surface-active agents have a higher purity than before, and no chlorine byproducts. The facility as well enables Cognis Mexico to provide products with low concentrations of 1,4-dioxane, thereby matching worldwide benchmarks. The new sulfation process operates at lower temperatures, so the products do not discolor and remain transparent — an important property for crystal-clear formulations. Finally, the improved sulfation technology makes possible higher throughput rates, which will eventually…