Unit operation
Sulfonation and sulfation toll manufacturing
For dye intermediates, surfactants and textile auxiliaries that need a sulfonic acid or sulfate group put on at scale.
Live listings
No verified unit lists Sulfonation capacity yet. Listings appear here the day our desk approves them, and the guide below is how we qualify one when it does.
Post your requirement and our broker desk looks for the capacity by hand, or list your own unit if you run one.
What sulfonation on job work involves
Sulfonation and sulfation are old, essential steps in Indian chemistry: they make dye intermediates, surfactants for detergents and personal care, and a long list of textile auxiliaries. They are bought as toll manufacturing (job work) because they need acid-resistant reactors, oleum or chlorosulfonic acid handling, tight temperature control and a route for the spent acid that most plants cannot offer for an occasional product.
Batch sulfonation in glass-lined or lead- and brick-lined vessels serves the dye and pharma side; falling-film sulfonation with sulfur trioxide serves high-volume surfactants. The reaction is strongly exothermic and selectivity depends on holding temperature and acid strength, so jacket capacity and dosing control are the real measure of a plant.
What to check before you send an enquiry
The questions our desk puts to a unit before it qualifies an enquiry for Sulfonation. A listing answers most of them; the trial batch answers the rest.
- Reagent handled — oleum, chlorosulfonic acid, sulfur trioxide or concentrated sulfuric acid — and the storage and dosing system for it.
- Reactor lining and heat removal: glass or brick lining in good condition, and chilled utility sized for your exotherm at your batch size.
- Spent acid route: dilution and neutralisation, gypsum handling or acid regeneration, and the consent limits it runs under.
- Acid-gas abatement: scrubbing for SO2 and SO3 mist, and stack monitoring records.
- Product isolation experience — salting out, filtration and drying of sulfonated products, which behave very differently from neutral organics.
Where the capacity is
Vatva and Vapi hold the dye-oriented sulfonation units; Ankleshwar runs it inside multi-purpose intermediate plants; Tarapur and Ambernath carry surfactant and textile-auxiliary capacity for the Mumbai market.
Unit operations
Industries served
Clusters
Common questions
- What is toll sulfonation?
- Toll sulfonation is having a sulfonic acid group introduced into your molecule at a plant set up for the reagents and the heat it involves. It is a foundation step for dye intermediates, detergent actives and several pharmaceutical intermediates, and it is bought on job work because the reagent handling and the spent-acid problem are specialised.
- Which sulfonating agents are used?
- Concentrated sulfuric acid and oleum for most aromatic sulfonations, sulfur trioxide for falling-film sulfonation of detergent actives, and chlorosulfonic acid where a sulfonyl chloride is wanted. Each has different corrosion, heat-removal and off-gas consequences, so name the agent when you ask for a quotation.
- What happens to the spent acid?
- It is the commercial question that decides whether a sulfonation is worth tolling. Spent acid is either reconcentrated, sold to a user who can take a lower grade, or neutralised and treated, and each route has a different cost. Ask which route the plant uses and whether that cost sits inside the processing charge.
- What should I check before sending material for sulfonation?
- Reactor lining and its inspection record, the cooling capacity against the reaction exotherm, off-gas scrubbing for sulfur dioxide and hydrogen chloride, the consent naming the process, and how the plant proves the degree of sulfonation on the finished batch.
Other unit operations
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