Titanium dioxide (TiO2) occurs as odourless, colourless to white crystalline powder in two forms, anatase and rutile. Titanium dioxide is not flammable, explosive and gives no reason to fire risks.
The main use of TiO2 is as a white powder pigment used in products such as paints, coatings, plastics, paper, inks, fibres, food and cosmetics. Titanium dioxide also has good ultraviolet (UV) light resistance properties and is seeing growing demand in photocatalysts.
It is used in products such as paints and coatings, including glazes and enamels, plastics, paper, inks, fibres, foods, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics. In particular, high performance grades of TiO2 are finding a growing market in the cosmetics sector and most toothpastes use TiO2.
Titanium dioxide is produced from either ilmenite, rutile or titanium slag. Titanium pigment is extracted by using either sulphuric acid (sulphate process) or chlorine (chloride route). The sulphate process employs simpler technology while the chloride route produces a purer product.
