In the next 10 to 20 years, China's activated carbon demand will further increase, and China's activated carbon industry will develop in the direction of low consumption, low pollution and high quality and high-tech. Wicken Carbon Environmental Protection Technology Co., LTD. With a registered capital of 10 million yuan, it is a scientific and technological private enterprise integrating research and development, production and sales of Suzhou air purification activated carbon.

Preliminary statistics show that the current national activated carbon enterprises have developed to more than 400, activated carbon production capacity of more than 500,000 tons, of which about 210,000 tons of exports this year, has exceeded the United States, Russia, Japan, ranking first in the world. Special high-grade carbon such as high specific surface carbon, high benzene carbon, fiber carbon, desulfurization carbon, etc., has developed rapidly, and its application has penetrated into aerospace, electronics, communications, energy, bioengineering and life science and other fields and departments. The production method has also developed from the simple flat plate furnace and smouldering furnace to the current rotary furnace, boiling furnace, tube furnace and other production furnace types and production processes. Our country has become a actually activated carbon production country.

However, compared with developed countries, there is still a big gap in China's activated carbon industry, mainly reflected in: small-scale enterprises, backward production equipment, low labor productivity, and weak market competitiveness. In China, 90% of the wood-based activated carbon factories are small enterprises with annual output ranging from several hundred tons to several thousand tons. There are almost no factories with annual production capacity of more than 10,000 tons. Most of these factories are scattered in forests and township enterprises, with small scale and backward production equipment that are difficult to update. The main equipment is similar, and labor productivity is generally in the range of tens of tons per person per year or lower. In contrast, in developed countries such as the United States and Japan, activated carbon production is concentrated in large enterprises with annual output of more than 10,000 tons. These large enterprises not only have large output, but also have advanced production equipment. They have mostly implemented automation of production lines and computer management and control, so labor productivity is very high, reaching several hundred tons per person  There are not many woods in our country , the production of activated carbon can only use forestry processing residues as raw materials, individual business owners in order to obtain greater profits, only the immediate interests, forest protection and ecological environment regardless, a piece of deforestation and burning charcoal, resulting in forest destruction, soil erosion. In recent years, although some manufacturers have made efforts in the control of environmental law infection, they have not been fundamentally controlled due to funding, technology, equipment and other reasons.

The downstream industry of activated carbon in China is developing rapidly. Its downstream industry is mainly the environmental protection industry. In the environmental protection industry, the use of activated carbon is the largest in urban water source purification projects and wastewater treatment projects, accounting for more than 70% of the total use of activated carbon; secondly, air purification, the use of activated carbon is also increasing year by year. The production process of activated carbon exists to a certain extent of environmental pollution, under the increasingly strict national environmental protection policy, solving the environmental protection problems of activated carbon production enterprises is a major issue for the sustainable development of the activated carbon industry.

According to relevant data, pollution control and reduction of consumption in chemical production can be done in terms of its technology. For example, the consumption of activated carbon zinc produced by the Japanese zinc chloride process is almost zero, and the equipment used is a rotary furnace; The consumption of activated carbon produced by phosphoric acid method in the United States is less than 0.2 tons/ton, and the furnace type used is also a rotary furnace. In recent years, some activated carbon enterprises in Zhejiang, Jiangsu and other places have adopted new converter and gas phase recovery devices, and acid consumption and gas phase pollution have been greatly reduced and improved. As far as possible, the appropriate activated carbon regeneration method is adopted to make the activated carbon "recycle and reuse, further save resources and reduce the use cost ."

The representatives of the Shanxi industry, Wen Xiaolin, Duan Jinsheng, Wang Dongping, and Liu Yuaiai, pointed out that the environmental protection aspects that should be particularly paid attention to in the activated carbon industry, as activated carbon is an effective product for environmental protection, but the production process itself is a high-energy consumption and pollution-generating process. With the seriousness of relevant laws and regulations in the country, the high pollution in the activated carbon industry is bound to be in the field of compulsory treatment. However, industry insiders pay less attention to this, and the environmental protection auxiliary facilities are not complete. In the future, it is inevitable that the industry will be eliminated due to environmental problems. And whoever pays attention to environmental protection and related facilities, the negative impact on the social environment will be small, and who will continue to develop and adapt to occupying the new fields of the country's strengthened environmental governance. For enterprises, the fundamental interests and benefits are self-evident.

As for the trend of active carbon industry in the 21st century, experts believe that active carbon, as an important branch of new materials and carbon materials, with its comprehensive excellent adsorption performance and wide application in various sectors of the national economy, will continue to display its vitality in the new century and will also face more development opportunities and challenges. Compared with developed countries, the active carbon industry in China is still relatively backward, especially in the application development and manufacture of specialized char. From the perspective of environmental protection, developed countries have gradually made the environmental protection industry the main consumer market for active carbon since the 1970s. In China, the environmental situation has become increasingly severe in the past ten years, and activated carbon for water and gas treatment has not yet been widely used. With the successful bidding for the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the 2010 Shanghai World Expo and China's goal of entering a well-off society in 10-20 years, it is estimated that the consumption of activated carbon in the field of environmental protection will increase exponentially. The initial estimate is that the environmental protection-related activated carbon consumption will not be less than 100,000-120,000 tons per year.

For the activated carbon industry, the first 20 years of this century is an important strategic opportunity period for great achievements. In order to guide the transformation and upgrading of scientific research, production and trade according to the development status of the activated carbon industry and the internal and external environment analysis, it is necessary to promote the work through scientific and technological innovation and structural optimization, so that the activated carbon industry can take the road of sustainable development of economy, environment and society. At the same time, it is necessary to deal with the relationship between the transformation and upgrading of activated carbon trade and the adjustment of industrial structure, correctly deal with the relationship between the development of activated carbon technology industry and traditional industries, accelerate the expansion to Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang and Gansu regions and areas in line with national industrial policies, and strive to form a number of activated carbon economic growth belts and industrial clusters with complementary advantages, internal and external integration, high value-added rate and strong innovation ability. Under the premise of maintaining the sustainable development of activated carbon trade, a new industrialization path with high scientific and technological content, less environmental pollution, large comparative advantages and full play of human resources will be developed.

Experts suggest that attention be paid to the effective use of existing activated carbon raw material resources, and actively seek alternative raw materials and develop new resources. There are many resources available for the production of activated carbon, such as bamboo and wood in the south, fruit hulls, fruit pits, wood processing residues in the north, cotton stalks, rice husks, high-quality coal, natural bitumen, carbon black, petroleum coke, petroleum bitumen, etc. A large amount of discarded petroleum coke in the petrochemical industry is also a good raw material for activated carbon, which can be produced by simple superheated steam processing. We should closely combine science and technology with production practice, vigorously advocate scientific and technological innovation, and organize forces to overcome pollution problems in chemical production and reduce consumption.

Dust-free technology ---- Focus

The industry is particularly concerned about the development and application of activated carbon dust-free technology, in many adsorbents, activated carbon with its unique adsorption characteristics and relatively low price in the field of liquid phase adsorption and gas phase adsorption plays a pivotal role. With China's accession to the WTO, China's original activated carbon is also a large number of countries in the world to purchase and use its excellent performance and price ratio. However, whether it is coal as raw materials, or the production of amorphous granular activated carbon, cylindrical activated carbon or spherical activated carbon as raw materials can not completely remove the dust attached to its surface, especially can not basically maintain the original adsorption characteristics of activated carbon under the premise of removing the dust attached to the surface of activated carbon. For a long time, the market has been calling for the emergence of activated carbon dust-free technology without success. People have tried to wash with water, wind blowing and other methods to remove activated carbon surface float ash. Although it has a certain effect, due to the friction between activated carbon particles and the friction of air flow on the surface of activated carbon, the formation of new micro-powder is caused, so the above method cannot fundamentally solve the problem. People have also tried to wrap activated carbon with polymer substances, but they have encountered the problem that the original physical adsorption capacity of activated carbon and the specific chemical adsorption capacity can therefore be reduced by 30 to 50%.

The issue of energy consumption has not yet attracted enough attention from the industry. According to data, the energy consumption of the same product in China is 11 times that of Japan, and activated carbon may be one of them. On the one hand, we feel that it is a small profit operation, on the other hand, we do not know where to start to improve economic efficiency, and the simple emphasis on selling at a low price is at least incomplete. The ratio of the price in the relative proportion of supply and demand, oversupply to the objective existence, otherwise there will be competition, since the objective existence of competition is a well-known fact, the market can not be artificially transferred, can only start from energy consumption. Reducing energy consumption can reduce costs and increase benefits for enterprises, and saving energy for society is a long-term plan for the country and the people.