Surface-Active Compounds as Forest-Industry By-Products

Bjarne Holmbom, Anna Sundberg and Anders Strand 

Process Chemistry Centre, Abo Akademi University, Finland 

Forests are a major source of renewable organic material on earth. One third of the world s forests are primarily used for production of wood and non-wood products [1]. Global wood removals were in 2005 estimated to be 3.1 billion cubic metres. Europe and North and Central America accounted for about half of the wood removals. Most of the wood in Europe and North America is used as industrial roundwood, while most of the wood in Africa, Asia and South America is still used as fuel for cooking and heating. 

Wood is composed of cellulose, hemicelluloses (also called non-cellulosic polysaccharides ) and lignin. There is also a wide variety of minor constituents, commonly called extractives , typically amounting to 1-5% of the wood. Concentrations as high as 10-30% can, however, be found in heartwood, knots and bark of many tree species [2-4]. 

Surf actants from Renewable Resources Edited by Mikael Kjellin and Ingeg d Johansson ( ) 2010 John Wiley Sons, Ltd 

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Surface-Active Compounds as Forest-Industry By-Products... 

Surface-Active Compounds as Forest-Industry By-Products 49 Table 3.1 Typical compositions of Nordic and American tall oil distillation products... 

Surface-active compounds can be produced from all wood constituents. For instance, water-soluble cellulose derivatives and lignin, in the form of lignosulfonates, can be used as dispersing agents in many applications. This chapter focuses on the production of resin and fatty acids as well as sterols and sterol ethoxylates as forest-industry by-products, and their use as surface-active components. Moreover, the potential production of hemi-celluloses and their possible utilization as steric stabilizers of oil-in-water emulsions is also outlined. 

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