Successfully refined high quality wood pulp from Vietnam

Vietnamese scientists have successfully refined Vietnamese wood pulp with quality almost as good as Canadian wood pulp at a lower cost, capable of replacing Canadian wood pulp as raw material for the production of Nitrocellulose.

This is the outstanding result of the topic "Research on using Vietnamese wood cellulose sources to prepare Nitrocellulose for the production of propellants to replace imported wood powder" conducted by Dr. Phan Duc Nhan and a group of young researchers from the Department of Explosives and Propellants, Faculty of Weapons, Military Technical Academy.

(Illustration photo: Thanh Ha/VNA)

According to Dr. Phan Duc Nhan, the research on refining wood cellulose to meet technical requirements for use as raw material for the preparation of Nitrocellulose for the production of propellants on a laboratory scale has been of interest to the group since early 2010.

The research results have confirmed that it is entirely possible to refine Vietnamese wood cellulose into products that meet the technical requirements for wood pulp used to produce Nitrocellulose to replace imported wood pulp. From the above results, the group proposed and was assigned by the Ministry of Science and Technology to carry out the above topic.

Dr. Phan Duc Nhan said that NC is prepared by nitro-oxidizing refined cellulose materials (cotton, wood, etc.) and is widely used in civil and military applications such as making propellants, adhesives, film-forming agents, etc.

Cellulose raw materials used to prepare Nitrocellulose for the production of propellants require high quality such as α-cellulose content of over 92% for wood pulp and over 96% for cotton, other quality indicators are very strict.

Currently, to produce Nitrocellulose, Vietnam has to use refined and imported cellulose raw materials such as Canadian and American wood pulp, Chinese cotton, etc.

“After being sent for quality analysis and spectroscopy according to standard methods at the Quality Control Department, Factory Z195 and the Weapons Technology Center, Military Technical Academy, Vietnam's refined wood pulp has fully met the technical requirements for wood pulp to be nitrified to produce Nitrocellulose, with quality equivalent to Canadian wood pulp and at a lower cost,” Dr. Phan Duc Nhan happily shared.

Mr. Nhan added that the group has now requested the authorities at all levels to allow opening a topic at a higher level to research and perfect the technology regimes for refining wood pulp in paper mills, using refined wood pulp to produce Nitrocellulose, testing propellant on a factory scale to be able to apply and transfer research results into the practical production of Nitrocellulose and propellant, gradually moving towards completely replacing imported Canadian wood pulp./.

According to (TTXVN) - VT