Synthesis of Y-Type Fluorinated Surfactant for Aqueous Film-Forming Foam Extinguishing Agent with High Performance
Zihan Liu, Chaojie Li, Zhiru Yuan, Weiwei He, Lifen Zhang, Zhenping Cheng
Abstract
A fluorinated surfactant exhibits extremely high surface activity and is the key component of the aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF) extinguishing agent. Unfortunately, the long fluorinated carbon chain has been proven to be bioaccumulative and has been banned internationally. This study aims to design and synthesize Y-shaped surfactants based on short fluorocarbon chains through atom transfer radical addition (ATRA), while maintaining the excellent performance as that with a long fluorocarbon chain. A minimum surface tension of 13.5 mN/m for ( F C 6 H C 6 ) 2 -CHOSO 3 Na can be reached with even a quite low concentration (0.04 g/L) according to a surface activity test, satisfying the performance requirements of the surfactant used for AFFF extinguishing agent. Moreover, the aqueous solution on the oil spreads out rapidly (<0.5 s), with a large spreading area of 2.89 cm 2 . In addition, an AFFF extinguishing agent formula based on the synthesized fluorinated surfactant is successfully obtained, whose foam production fulfills the requirements of the national standard of a fire-extinguishing agent (GB 15308-2006). In subsequent fire extinguishing tests, this extinguishing agent behaves successfully. To sum up, the Y-type surfactant is a degradable surfactant, which can be used as an AFFF extinguishing agent with excellent performance, highly promising in practical application.