Carboxylated bleached kraft pulp from maleic anhydride copolymers

Abstract Seven copolymers of maleic anhydride were hydrolyzed and impregnated into sheets of bleached softwood kraft pulps to enhance market pulp properties. Drying the impregnated pulps at 120 °C for 10 minutes, attached to the fiber surfaces up 0.16 meq of carboxyl groups per gram of dry pulp. Heating the impregnated pulps regenerates succinic anhydride moieties which can then form stable ester linkages with cellulosic hydroxyls. The pH of the impregnation solution is important. Impregnation with solutions at pH 8 gave polymer contents without repulping issues. By contrast, impregnation at pH 4 gave dried pulp sheets that were too strong to enable repulping in a paper mill. Although most of the seven copolymers were fixed to cellulose, poly(ethylene-alt-maleic anhydride) gave the highest density of carboxyl groups. The simplicity of waterborne polymers and mild drying temperatures suggests maleic anhydride copolymer treatment could be implemented in a conventional market pulp mill.