• International Journal of Safety
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.14-17
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• 2005

Recycled polyol was obtained by glycolysis of MDI-based Polyurethane(PU) rigid foam. The chemical structure of the recycled pclyol was confirmed by GC(gas chromatography) and 1H-NMR. The recycled polyol throughout the glycolysis contained liquid polyol and methylenedianiline(MDA). MDA which could cause liver cancer is carcinogenic material. TWA(Time Weighted Average.) amount for MDA in MSDS(Material Safety Data Sheets) was confined less than 0.1 ppm. The melting temperature of MDA is $92^{\circ}C$, and boiling temperature is $398^{\circ}C$. During the gylcolysis most of MDA was dissolved in liquid polyol. The probability that MDA diffuses into the atmosphere is low but there could be an absorption of MDA into skin. Furthermore because MDA is amine compound, recycled polyol which contained MDA had a difficulty in reaction control of polyurethane. Therefore reduction of MDA amount was needed strongly. In this study the elimination of MDA were performed through deamination of the recycled polyol by glycidyl ether compounds. As glycolysis was proceeded, the amount of MDA was 9.8 wt % at early stage and increased up to 14.0 wt % after 8 hours reaction. It was found that 2-Ethylhexyl glycidyl ether which contains aliphatic moiety was very effective compound for eliminating the primary aromatic amine compound :md the optimal mole ratio of 2-ethylhexyl glycidyl ether to MAD was 3. The final polyol after deamination by 2-ethylhexyl glycidyl ether has an appropriate viscosity(less than 500 centi poise) for polyurethane reaction.