Natural Plant Oils in Foam

Sources of Plant Oils for Foam Manufacturing

Plants used as sources of oils for manufacturing foam

Natural Plant Oils in Foam

Several manufacturers claim that some or all of the foams used in their mattresses are either partially or wholly made from plant oils. Terms used for these are soy foam, plant-based, botanical-oil, natural oils, etc. Plant oils used include those extracted from soy beans, castor beans, canola (rapeseed), palm kernel, coconut, peanuts, and other seeds. How are these oils used in making foam? And how does this affect the use of fossil fuel sources (petroleum and coal oil)?

Oil itself does not form foam, at least not the kind you can sleep on. Bedding and furniture foams, other than latex foam (foam rubber), are forms of polyurethane foam, a semi-rigid, flexible material which is both supportive and cushioning. Polyurethane is a polymer, chains of repeated links of molecules. These molecules are polyols, alcohols with several hydroxyl branches. An alcohol is an oil (hydrocarbon) which is partly oxidized. A hydroxyl is an -OH branch of oxygen and hydrogen.

Some polyols are always produced when refining petroleum. One plant oil, castor bean oil, contains a natural polyol. Most other plant oils have to be modifed to make polyols. The components of these oils are fatty acids, like mono-, di- and triglycerides, the precursors of cholesterol. The fatty acids used are long chains with a double carbon bond (C=C on a diagram) in the middle. Using ozone or other reactors, hydroxyls are added to the chains.

150px-Castor_oil_svg

Tri-ester from Castor Oil

To make the polyurethane, the polyols are combined with isocyanates. The reactions form endless chains which cross-link to form the polyurethane. Gasses released by the reactions and air introduced during the process make the foam.

Until recently, only a small portion of petroleum in polyurethane foam could be replace by plant polyols (aka biopolyols) and still produce a quality foam. Refinement of the process, including using water for the solvent, make it possible to use a higher percentage of biopolyols. However, we need to carefully examine the claims of manufacturers and retailers in promoting their products. Don’t be afraid to ask what proportion of the oils used in making the foams are plant derived.

Use of polyols derived from natural plant oils reduces the use of petroleum in more than one way. First, it means less petroleum is used as the raw material. Second, this means less petroleum used as fuel for refining petroleum for polyols. Third, modifying plant oils requires less energy.

Other advantages of using plant polyols in manufacturing polyurethane and its derivative foams include 1) less or no VOCs (volatile organic compounds), and 2) less degradation of the foam by moisture (such as from sweat), and some plant-oil foams are less flammable.

However, use of plant oils has its own environmental concerns. First is land use for growing plant oil crops. Is the land chosen wisely? Or does it degrade natural resources (such as rain forests)? Second, are the farming practices environmentally acceptable? This includes preventing erosion and whether chemical pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers are used. Also, does raising and using plants for this purpose compete with food crops, thereby raising food prices?

In the final analysis, using natural plant oils to make polyurethane, memory foam, and other foams for bedding products is a net benefit for health, safety, and the environment. And this will grow as technological development improves the processes involved.


 

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This entry was posted on Sunday, December 7th, 2014 at 1:28 PM and is filed under beds, foam, mattresses, memory foam, polyurethane . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

10 thoughts on “Natural Plant Oils in Foam”

  1. Is this safe to breath? What about if a fire started and this caught on fire, will it release harmful gases, etc?

    1. Gary,
      The toxic gasses would be a little less with plant oils.
      The natural oils used in foam are not as toxic unburned as petroleum, so the foam is proportionally .less toxic by the proportion of plant oils used.
      As to fire retardant, there are two questions to be answered:
      1. What kind of fire retardant is used? If chemicals, they are more toxic than untreated foam. Wool and silica-infused rayon are non-tosic slternatives to chemicals.
      2. What are the chances of toxic fumes fro a fire? Is it worth the health risk of the chemicals? Wiegh the chances of each to see which is the greater health hazard.
      I hope this helps.
      Wesley

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