A Story of Vinyl Chloride

Let us talk about such an example. Paper industry needs a chanical called sodium hydroxide (caustic soda) to clean the pulp. The most convenient way to produce sodium hydroxide of a good quality is to use electrolysis of a brine solution containing sodium chloride. That is, if you put electric current through the solution, you can get a sodium metal which can easily be converted to sodium hydroxide by reacting the metal with a steam. The other product of the electrolysis of the brine solution 

Vinyl chloride is polymerized to produce polyvinyl chloride (PVC) as mentioned earlier. It is cheap, and fairly stable and sturdy, and hence has been used very widely for such purposes as plastic film, plastic cover, fake surface material (in any shade like walnut) for wall and furniture, and water pipe. 

Another problem is the formation of HCl when it is burned. It is argued that it even forms the toxic dioxin when it is burned at high temperatures in the incinerator. The biggest problem, however, seems to be that some toxic substances including dioxin are produced as by-products in the process of producing vinyl chloride itself. How to treat them and contain them is the problan. 

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