Titanium is widely used in the chlor-alkali industry. First, it has excellent corrosion resistance to wet chlorine and sodium chloride solutions. Second, its electrochemical properties are suitable for use as anode materials. The United States began to manufacture chlor-alkali equipment as early as the 1960s, and this application has developed rapidly, with a compound annual growth rate of 8%. In 2021, around 50% of the world’s chlorine production uses anodes coated with ruthenium-titanium. In the production of chlorine in Russia, more than 80% of the equipment and pipelines are made of titanium. The entire chlor-alkali industry, the production of chlorine and other oxides, toxic chemicals, chloramines and bleaching powders, accounts for more than 60% of the chemical sector’s use of titanium equipment. In the chlor-alkali industry, Japan uses titanium anodes, which are the most widely used titanium products in Japan. Since the early 1980s, China’s chlor-alkali industry has used titanium anodes and achieved good economic results.
In the US chemical industry, the amount of titanium used in chlor-alkali production coolers is >50%. Allied Chemical Industry Company of the United States (Allied) can only use graphite to make cooler tubes for 2 to 3 years, but it can be used for more than 10 years after switching to titanium tubes. The use of thin-walled titanium tubes saves the work of embedding graphite strips on the cooler and can withstand extremely high heat transfer. For example, the heat conducted by a 78m2 titanium cooler is equivalent to that of a 140m2 graphite cooler. The coolers used in the chlor-alkali industry in the Soviet Union and Russia are all made of titanium. Shanghai Liaoyuan Chemical Industry Co., Ltd.’s economic indicators for wet chlorine gas cooling, and technical and economic indicators for graphite tube and titanium tube coolers (see table). From these data it can be seen that indirect cooling of wet chlorine is much better than direct spray cooling with water.
Shanghai Liaoyuan Chemical Industry Co., Ltd. can save 400,000 tons/year of water, 1,360 tons/year of H2SO4 for drying, and 1,400 tons/year of chlorine after switching to an indirect titanium cooler. Titanium tube coolers have a much longer service life than graphite tube coolers.