Effects of Fiber Characteristics on the Greaseproofing Property of Paper

Grease barrier food containers are commonly used for packaging of fast food, cooked food, and food in general. Greaseproofing is also used for certificate paper and label paper etc. Different pulp raw materials, due to their different fiber morphology and chemical compositions, produce papers of varying characteristics. We used optical photomicroscopy and fiber analysis data to evaluate fiber morphology and traits under various beating conditions in order to understand which pulp raw materials produced superior greaseproofing property when a fluorinated greaseproofing agent was added internally. The experiment studied 9 species of pulps, including 2 softwood (northern pine and radiata pine) bleached kraft pulps which were beaten to 550 and 350 mL CSF, respectively; 3 hardwoods (eucalypts, acacia, mixed Indonesian hardwoods) bleached kraft pulps which were beaten to 450 and 250 mL CSF, respectively; and nonwood fibers of reed, bagasse, and abaca. A fluorinated greaseproofing chemical at 0.12% dosage with respect to dry pulp was added to each pulp preparation and formed handsheets. A total of 67 sets of handsheets were prepared, and their basis weights, thickness, bulks, opacities, wet opacities, air resistance, water absorption and degrees of greaseproofing were measured for an overall evaluation of pulp and freeness on greaseproofing papers. The experimental fiber length, coarseness and distribution characteristics and the greaseproofing results suggest that softwood pulps (radiate pine > northern pine) were superior to hardwood pulps (eucalypts > acacia > mixed Indonesian hardwoods). The unbeaten pulps gave papers with high porosities and nearly devoid of greaseproofing property. Greaseproofing is proportional to air resistance. Among the nonwood fibers, bagasse had the best greaseproofing property, followed by reed and abaca was the poorest. With regards to waterproofing property, hardwood pulps (mixed Indonesian hardwoods > acacia > eucalypts) were better than softwood pulps (northern pine > radiate pine). Among the Nonwood fibers, reed had the highest waterproofing property, and it was followed by abaca, while bagasse had the poorest waterproofing characteristic. In summary, bleached kraft northern pine, eucalypts and reed pulps were best suited for making greaseproofing papers, Freeness of the pulps should be kept at $200{\sim}280mL$ CSF for optimal performance.