Nylon plant effluents

The plant began full-scale operation in 1962 and produced acetic, adipic, and propionic acids acetaldehyde butanol hexamethyldiamine vinyl acetate nylon and other chemical products from petroleum-base stocks. The effluent was collected at waste treatment facilities as two separate mixtures. Because mixing two wastestreams produced considerable precipitation, the wastestreams were processed and injected separately into two wells. 

EFFOL A process for making nylon salt (hexamethylenediamine di-adipate). Developed by Rhone-Poulenc in the 1980s and now used in its plant at Chalampe, France. It produces much less effluent than the earlier process. 

Polyamides. Although high molecular weight polyamides such as nylon-6, nylon-6,6, and nylon-12 resisted microbial (3, 4,19) and enzyme attack (17), low molecular weight cyclic and linear oligomers of c-aminocaproic acid were utilized by certain bacteria isolated from the effluent water of a nylon-6 plant. These include Corynebacterium auran-tiacum B-2 reported by Fukumura (20,21) and Achromobacter guttatus KI 72 reported by Okada et al. (22). 

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