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More environmentally friendly alternatives to PFOS-compounds and PFOA

Appendix E Use of telomer alcohols in Denmark

As the newest research indicate that telomer alcohols may be degraded to PFOA in the environment, a search for the use of telomer alcohols in the Danish Product Register was also performed.

A preliminary search was carried out in the SPIN ^[16] database – a database of product registers in the Nordic countries. The preliminary search involved the most typical telomer alcohols as listed in Table 0.1.

Table 0.1: List of telomer alcohols.

This search showed that only the perfluorooctanol compound (6:2 FTOH) of the compounds listed in Table 0.1 was registered in the product register of the Nordic countries with a production/sale in Denmark, i.e. is used in chemical products produced in Denmark (which must be labelled as dangerous).

A contact to the Danish Product Register revealed the following about the use of perfluoroctanol with CAS number 647-42-7 (Personal communication Jensen, 2004):

• Only one company in Denmark has registered a use of the compounds.
• The compound is used in fluxing agents.
• The compound is registered in four products, but only in one newer product (from 2003).
• The one newer product represents a total annual sale of 1 kilo of perfluorooctanol.

The company, which had registered a use of the compound perfluorooctanol, was contacted in order to learn more about the use and possible alternatives.

It turned out that the compound was used in four products, but only one of the products was used today. As listed above, this one product represents a total annual sale of 1 kilo of perfluorooctanol. The company sells about 3-4,000 litres of the fluxing agent, which means that perfluorooctanol is added to the product in a concentration of about 0.03% (assuming a density of 1 kilo/litre).

According to the company the fluxing product will automatically go out of use in a couple of years as the "European Directive 2002/95/EC of January 27 2003 on the restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment" states that after July ^1st 2006 lead is no longer permitted in electrical and electronic equipment. (Directive 2002/95/EC, 2003). This means that plumbing with lead is not longer permitted by this date.

Today plumbing is carried out with the use of soldering tin that consists of 63% lead and 37% tin. When using this leaded soldering tin it is necessary to use a soldering flux to prepare the surface for the plumbing. Fluxing agents are used in automatically closed systems and are sprayed on the subject, which is then heated (to remove the fluxing agent) and then the plumbing is carried out.

The alternatives to leaded soldering tin are use of soldering tin of either pure tin or soldering tin with a small percentage of silver and copper, 0.7% and 3.5% respectively. With a use of lead-free soldering tin it is, however, possible to use water-based fluxing agents instead of the solvent based fluxing agents (with perfluorocompounds). This means that the use of perfluorocompounds in fluxing agents automatically will cease with the implementation of lead-free plumbing.

Footnotes

[16] Substances in Preparations in Nordic Countries - www.spin2000.net/spin.html.

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Version 1.0 June 2005, © Danish Environmental Protection Agency