336.    BRAYBROOK, F. H.  Development of Synthetic Detergents and Future Trends.  Chem. and Ind., 1948, pp. 404-407, 409-410. 

                  Growth of the synthetic-detergent industry is traced and statistics are quoted.  In the United States alone for 1947, it is believed that 150,000 tons (35-40% active content), or 7.5% of the American soap market, were sold.  Assuming that 1 ton of synthetic soap (20% active content) replaces 1 ton of fatty-acid soap (60% fatty acid content), there is already a replacement of 15% of the United States soap market by synthetic detergents.  The trend in Germany during the war years was away from the use of natural fatty acids in soap manufacture to the use of synthetic detergents based on nonfatty raw materials.  The chief raw materials, therefore, were the oxidation products of Fischer-Tropsch paraffin wax or gatsch or the wax obtained by the hydrogenation of brown coal.  The main concentration of effort was toward the production of the alkyl sulfonates, common known as Mersolates, prepared by the sulfochlorination of the Fischer-Tropsch paraffins.  The total output reached 85,000 tons per annum (calculated as 100% active matter) from both I. G. Farbenindustrie factories at Leuna and Wolfen, the equivalent of probably 170,000 tons of the prewar marketed soap.  The future trend is evident; an increasing consumer demand for edible fats, with a decreasing utilization of natural fats for the manufacture of soap and an increasing demand for synthetic detergents from nonfatty oil raw materials for which petroleum and synthesis products are the obvious sources.