History of chemical industry

Chemical processing:

The history of chemical processing before the formation of industry can be traced back to ancient times from the middle of the 18th century. Since then, people have been able to use chemical processing methods to make some necessities of life, such as pottery, brewing, dyeing, smelting, paint, paper, and the manufacture of medicine, gunpowder and soap

There are pottery fragments in Neolithic caves in China. In the Yangshao culture around the 50th century BC, there were red pottery, gray pottery, black pottery, colored pottery, etc. (See color pictures [colored pottery pot fired in China's Neolithic period (2500 BC)],[three-colored pottery camel fired in the Sui Dynasty (581-618)],[moire paint made in the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC - 25 AD)], [Water notes of celadon fired in Yuezhou Kiln in Tang Dynasty (618 ~ 907)],[Chinese ancient alchemy sketch]). Among the cultural relics unearthed in Hemudu, Zhejiang, China, there are wooden bowls of the same period, painted with vermilion raw paint. Shang Dynasty (17th-11th century BC) ruins have pieces of lacquerware Warring States period (475-221 BC) lacquerware technology has been very exquisite

In the 20th century BC, Xia Yu drank wine and used it for sacrifices. In the 25th century BC, Egypt wrapped mummies in dye. In the 21st century BC, China has entered the Bronze Age, the 5th century BC, into the Iron Age, with smelting copper, iron to make weapons, farming tools, cooking utensils, tableware, Musical Instruments, currency and so on. Salt, early for consumption, in the 11th century BC, the Zhou Dynasty has been in charge of salt officials. From the 7th to 6th centuries BC, Phoenicians made soap from goat fat and plant ash. In the Eastern Han Dynasty of China in the 1st century AD, the papermaking process was quite perfect

Around AD, China and Europe entered alchemy, the period of alchemy. China researched medicine by refining the elixir of life. In the 16th century, Li Shizhen's Compendium of Materia Medica (Compendium of Materia Medica) summarized the great achievements of previous medicines, which was of high academic level. In addition, the mixing method of three ingredients has been recorded in the 7th to 9th centuries, and gunpowder was used for military purposes in the early Song Dynasty. Europe since the 3rd century superstitious alchemy, until the 15th century from alchemy gradually turned into medicine, the history of the 15th to 17th centuries for the pharmaceutical period. In pharmaceutical research, chemicals such as sulfuric, nitric, hydrochloric and organic acids are prepared in the laboratory to prepare drugs. Although it did not form an industry, it led to the development of chemical preparation methods, which prepared the conditions for the establishment of the chemical industry in the mid-18th century

Early chemical industry:

From the middle of the 18th century to the beginning of the 20th century was the primary stage of the chemical industry. At this stage, inorganic chemical industry has begun to take shape, organic chemical industry is forming, and polymer chemical industry is in the embryonic stage.

Inorganic chemical industry

The first typical chemical plant was the sulfuric acid plant established in England in the 1740s. First with sulfur as raw material, then with pyrite as raw material, the product is mainly used to make nitric acid, hydrochloric acid and drugs, at that time the output is not large. During the industrial revolution, the textile industry developed rapidly. It and glass, soap and other industries use a large number of alkali, while vegetative alkali and trona are in short supply. In 1791, under the reward of the French Academy of Sciences, he obtained a patent, built a factory with salt as raw materials, and led the development of sulfuric acid (one of the raw materials) industry; The hydrogen chloride produced in production is used to make hydrochloric acid, chlorine gas, bleaching powder and other substances urgently needed by the industry.

Soda ash can also be causticized to make full use of raw materials and by-products, which was the pioneering work of chemical enterprises at that time; Filling devices for the absorption of hydrogen chloride, rotary furnaces for calcination of raw materials and semi-finished products, and equipment for concentration, crystallization, filtration, etc., are gradually used in other chemical enterprises, laying the foundation for the operation of chemical units. The Luebblin process was gradually replaced by the Solvay process (see) in the early 20th century. Electrolysis of salt appeared in the late 19th century. In this way, the production of acids and alkalis, the basis of the entire chemical industry, has begun to take shape.

Organic chemical industry

After the development of textile industry, natural dyes can not meet the needs; With the development of iron and steel industry and coking industry, the by-product coal tar needs to be utilized. Chemists separated coal tar into,,,, anthracene, phenanthrene, etc. In 1856, the British synthesized aniline purple dye, and determined that the structure of natural alizarin was dihydroxyanthraquinone after analysis, then using the anthracene in coal tar as raw material, through oxidation, substitution, hydrolysis, rearrangement and other reactions, imitated the same product as natural alizarin. Similarly, the pharmaceutical industry and the fragrance industry have successively synthesized the same chemicals as the natural products, and the variety is increasing. In 1867, the Swedes invented dynamite (see), which is widely used in mining and military industry.

At that time there was another pillar of organic chemical production, the acetylene chemical industry. In 1895, the first factory was established using coal and limestone as raw materials to produce calcium carbide (i.e.) by electric heating. Calcium carbide was then hydrolyzed to produce acetylene, which was used as a starting point to produce a series of basic organic raw materials such as acetaldehyde and acetic acid. After the development of the middle of the 20th century, calcium carbide energy consumption was too high, and most of the original acetylene series products were converted to raw materials for production.

Polymer material

In 1839, the United States used sulfur and heated natural rubber, so that it cross-linked into elastomers, used in tires and other rubber products, widely used, this is the germination of polymer chemical industry. In 1869, the United States with camphor plasticizer cellulose nitrate made of plastic, very valuable.1891 in Besancon, France built the first artificial silk factory.1 In 909, the United States made phenolic resin, commonly known as bakelite powder, widely used in electrical insulation materials.

These budding products, in variety, yield, quality and other aspects are far from meeting the requirements of society. Therefore, the production of the above basic organic chemicals and the production of polymer materials have been greatly developed after the establishment of petrochemical industry.

Great development period:

From the beginning of the 20th century to the 1960s and 1970s after the war, this was the main stage in which the chemical industry really became large-scale production, and some major fields were formed during this period. And petrochemical industry has been developed, developed, and gradually rise. At the beginning of this period, concepts developed by people such as the United Kingdom and the United States laid the foundation for chemical engineering. It has promoted the development of production technology, whether it is the size of the device, or the output of the product has grown rapidly.

Synthetic ammonia industry

In the early 20th century, with the physicochemical reaction equilibrium theory, the catalytic method of direct synthesis of ammonia by nitrogen and hydrogen was proposed, and the idea of supplementary recycling after the separation of raw gas and product was further solved. Thus, Germany was able to build the first ammonia production plant in World War I to meet the needs of the war. Synthetic ammonia originally used coke as raw material, and changed to oil or natural gas after the 1940s, so that the chemical industry and the two major sectors of the petroleum industry are more closely linked, and the rational use of raw materials and energy.

Petrochemical industry

In the United States in 1920, it was the beginning of large-scale development of petrochemical industry. In 1939, the United States Standard Oil Company developed a catalytic reforming process for hydrogen, which became an important source of aromatics. In 1941, the first unit was built in the United States to produce ethylene as a raw material. After the Second World War, due to the continuous expansion of the chemical product market, petroleum can provide a large number of cheap organic chemical raw materials, and due to the development of chemical production technology, petrochemical industry has gradually formed. Even regions that do not produce oil, such as Western Europe and Japan, also use crude oil as raw materials to develop petrochemicals. The same raw material or the same product, each chemical enterprise has different process routes or different catalysts.

Since the basic organic raw materials and polymer monomers are based on petrochemical as raw materials, people use ethylene production as a sign to measure organic chemical industry. In the 1980s, more than 90% of organic chemical products came from petrochemical industry. For example, etc., in the past, calcium carbide acetylene was used as raw material, then it was changed to oxygen chlorination to produce vinyl chloride, and propylene ammoxidation (see) to produce acrylonitrile. In 1951, carbon monoxide and hydrogen were obtained by steam conversion from natural gas as raw material, which was paid attention to and used for production, and individual areas were used for production.

Polymer chemical industry

Polymer materials were used in the military during the war, converted to civilian use after the war, and achieved great development as a new material industry. As a strategic material, natural rubber is produced in the tropics, blocked by shipping, all countries are studied. In 1937, the German Farben company successfully developed. Later, various countries have successively developed a variety of synthetic rubber such as butyl, butyl, chloroprene, nitrile, isoamyl, ethylene and propylene, each with different characteristics and uses. In 1937, the United States successfully synthesized nylon 66(see), spun by melt method, because of its good strength, used as parachutes and tires. Since then, polyester, Vinylon, acrylic and other products have been put into production, and because of the petrochemical industry as its raw materials, it has gradually occupied most of the natural fiber and man-made fiber market. In terms of plastics, after phenolic resin, thermosetting resins such as alkyd resins were produced. After the 1930s, varieties continued to appear, such as the large varieties of plastics so far, for the excellent insulation materials at that time, in 1939, high pressure for submarine cables and radar, low pressure polyethylene, isotropic polypropylene was successfully developed, opening up a wide range of uses for civil plastics, which is Ziegler - Nata Catalysts make a great contribution to polymer chemistry. This period also saw the emergence of high-temperature and corrosion-resistant materials, such as polytetrafluoroethylene, which is known as the king of plastics. After the Second World War, some are also used in the automotive industry, but also as building materials, packaging materials, etc., and gradually become a large variety of plastics.

Fine chemical industry

On the other hand, reactive dyes were invented to combine dyes with fibers in chemical bonds. Synthetic fibers and their blends require new dyes, such as active disperse dyes for polyester, acrylic, and poly-cotton blends. In addition, there are special dyes for laser, liquid crystal, microscopic technology and so on. In the 1940s, after Switzerland P.H. Miller invented the first organochlorine pesticides, he developed a series of organochlorines and organophosphorus, which have special effects such as stomach killing, contact killing, and internal absorption. Later, it requires high efficiency and low toxicity or no residual toxicity of pesticides, such as bionic synthesis. In the 1960s, the development is very fast, there are some good varieties, such as pyridine herbicides, benzimidazole fungicides and so on. In addition, there are antibiotic pesticides (see), such as Jinggangmycin developed in China in 1976 to combat rice sheath blight. In medicine,

In 1910, France made 606 arsenic preparation (a special drug for the radical cure of melesin), and the structure was improved to make 914 and 30 years of compounds, steroids and other are from the structure of the improvement, play a special effect. In 1928, the British discovery, opened up a new field of antimicrobial drugs. Later research on the successful treatment of physiological diseases, such as cardiovascular disease, psychiatric drugs, and contraceptives. In addition, a number of specific diagnostic drugs are available. Get rid of the tradition of natural paint, use, such as alkyd resin, acrylic resin, etc., to meet the needs of the automotive industry and other advanced coating. After the Second World War, styrene butadiene latex was made into water-based coatings and became a large variety of architectural coatings. The use of new technologies such as high pressure airless spraying, electrostatic spraying, electrophoretic coating, cathodic electrodeposition coating, and light curing (see) can save labor and materials, and thus develop the corresponding coating varieties.