Specialty chemicals, or chemical additives, are rapidly becoming a trillion dollar industry and are used in a wide range of industrial sectors, including energy, cosmetics, detergents, food, materials, textiles and pharmaceuticals. Chemical additives are added to materials or products to enhance their performance, stability and lifetime or to instill other beneficial properties to the material as a whole.

There is a wide range of additive types, including surfactants, enzymes, nanoparticles (metal, inorganic and polymeric), fragrance molecules, dyes and more. Each specific additive provides a unique benefit or function to a material or process. In fact, sometimes chemical additives are referred to as functional chemicals or chemical agents. Some chemical additives or additive packages can consist of multiple components and/or provide multiple functions that can reduce the number of ingredients a compounding chemist or formulator needs to sample and test.

Surfactants are widely used as additives in detergents to increase the cleaning effectiveness of a detergent formulation. Simpler, cheaper detergents may contain one basic surfactant, but premium, higher-end detergents often contain multiple, more complex surfactants that enable faster cleaning and a broader range of stain removal capabilities. Additionally, enzymes may be added to help remove specific stains such as proteins or starches. Finally, surfactants are also widely used in oil-recovery initiatives. Enhanced or tertiary oil recovery involves treating oil wells with chemicals that actively remove additional quantities of oil that are not removed by inherent pressure or pumping.

Surfactants and surface active agents are also important in controlling the settling rate of dispersed particles in a product. Dispersants, deflocculants, emulsifiers and surfactants help to keep particles, fillers, oil droplets or dirt suspended in a liquid or to form a colloid. In applications where particles need to be removed from a product or process, settling agents or flocculants are used. Softening, chelating or sequestering agents are useful for capturing dissolved metal ions in a liquid.

Read the entire white paper here.