Formaldehyde - a chemical raw material that modern people are afraid of but cannot do without. The fear is because it is extremely harmful to the human body; the cannot do without it because it is widely used in various daily necessities as a chemical raw material. It is a colorless and irritating gas that irritates the human eyes and nose; it is listed as a first-class carcinogen by the World Health Organization.
Formaldehyde is widely present in daily life, the most common in various furniture and building materials, followed by rubber and plastic products, which also contain a certain amount of formaldehyde; even the clothes we wear every day may contain formaldehyde.
1. Formaldehyde with diverse functions
The formaldehyde volatilized from furniture and building materials comes from the adhesives in them. Wooden building materials will use adhesives to fix and bond them during production and decoration, and the so-called "no formaldehyde, no glue" also leads to the presence of formaldehyde in building materials. When producing adhesives, formaldehyde needs to be added to act as a curing agent to accelerate the curing of the bonding material through reaction, increase the cohesion of the glue, and enable the bonding material to complete bonding at low temperatures. Of course, the formaldehyde in adhesives is not added in unlimited amounts. The free formaldehyde content of solvent-based adhesives used for decoration must be ≤0.50mg/kg, and the free formaldehyde content of water-based adhesives must be ≤1.0mg/kg.
Formaldehyde can also be synthesized into various polymer materials, such as polyoxymethylene (POM), phenolic plastics (PF), urea formaldehyde foam plastics, polyvinyl alcohol formal foam plastics, etc. The polymer materials synthesized by formaldehyde have excellent comprehensive performance, and there are few suitable substitutes, so they can be widely used.
In addition, formaldehyde can also be used as a dyeing auxiliary in the production of clothing fabrics to achieve wrinkle-proof and flame-retardant effects, maintain the durability of printing and dyeing, and improve the feel of the fabric itself. However, this part of formaldehyde is not completely reacted during production and synthesis and is adsorbed on the surface of the fabric, and is slowly released under the action of sunlight, sweat stains and body temperature. The content of formaldehyde in textiles in my country is stipulated. The formaldehyde content of Class A textiles should not exceed 20mg/kg, the formaldehyde content of Class B textiles should not exceed 75mg/kg, and the formaldehyde content of Class C textiles should not exceed 300mg/kg. Among them, infant textile products should meet Class A requirements, products that directly contact the skin should at least meet Class B requirements, and products that do not directly contact the skin should at least meet Class C requirements.
2. Formaldehyde prevention is not that complicated
Although formaldehyde is everywhere in life and is extremely harmful, it is relatively easy to avoid it. The first thing is to choose products that meet national standards. After testing, the formaldehyde residues of the products have reached a safe level and have almost no impact on daily life. The formaldehyde residues that cannot be avoided in new home decoration can be solved by long-term ventilation. A newly renovated new house can also reduce the formaldehyde content to a harmless level in 3 to 6 months of ventilation through long-term ventilation; for formaldehyde residues on daily textiles, we can reduce the formaldehyde content by washing with water multiple times. Therefore, we don’t have to talk about "aldehyde" color change. Do a good job of prevention and pay attention to ventilation to reduce the harm caused by formaldehyde.
