Reported by Doubao

Against the backdrop of the in-depth implementation of the 14th Five-Year Plan for Plastic Pollution Control, the PVC product industry is accelerating its shift away from traditional toxic stabilizers. The latest market data shows that the scale of China's composite PVC stabilizer market reached 13.5 billion yuan in 2024. Among them, calcium-zinc composite stabilizers maintained a dominant position with a 62% market share. Moreover, the new-type calcium-zinc stabilizers, which combine environmental protection and transparency, have become a "hot commodity" in high-end fields such as footwear materials, medical care, and toys.

Technological Iteration Solves Industry Pain Points

For a long time, the processing of transparent PVC products has faced the dilemma of "difficulty in balancing environmental protection and performance": traditional lead salt stabilizers have strong thermal stability but contain heavy metals, while organotin stabilizers meet transparency standards but have odor defects and high costs.

In terms of transparency, its transparency can reach over 90%, which is similar to that of organotin stabilizers, meeting the appearance and texture requirements of products such as crystal shoes and medical catheters. It has also made breakthroughs in thermal stability—it can maintain a stable state for more than 50 minutes at a high temperature of 200°C, and effectively inhibit resin degradation and yellowing in the processing range of 160-180°C, solving the coloring problem in the processing of transparent products.

"The coupling system design of this stabilizer is crucial," industry experts pointed out. Its special structure can enhance the compatibility between inorganic fillers and PVC resins, improve melt strength, reduce melt fracture during injection molding, and perfectly match SG-7 to SG-5 resins. More notably, its balanced lubrication design can shorten plasticization time by 10-15%, significantly improving production efficiency.

Full-Scenario Adaptation Activates Industrial Value

From the perspective of application scenarios, transparent calcium-zinc stabilizers have formed a full-coverage product matrix for "flexible + rigid" products. In the field of flexible products, when used in conjunction with AC foaming agents, it can make the foam cells of PVC shoe soles denser, significantly improving elasticity and wear resistance, and accurately meeting the 4-5mm foaming requirement of compression-molded foamed shoe soles. In the medical field, the barium-free and tin-free formula that meets multiple international standards such as FDA and ROHS has been widely used in the production of infusion tubes and protective equipment.

For enterprises, such products bring tangible cost advantages. By using them together with organotin stabilizers, the amount of organotin added can be reduced, and the odorless feature optimizes the production environment. The person in charge of a footwear material enterprise in Qingdao revealed: "After switching to transparent calcium-zinc stabilizers, not only did our export products successfully pass EU inspections, but the cost per ton of raw materials also decreased by 800 yuan."

Green Transformation Spurs New Market Opportunities

With the increase in the application ratio of recycled PVC and the growth of export demand, the market space for transparent calcium-zinc stabilizers continues to expand. In 2024, the total export value of China's composite PVC stabilizers increased by 11.3% year-on-year, and the demand for environmentally friendly stabilizers in regions such as Southeast Asia and South America is particularly strong. Industry insiders predict that with the performance improvement brought by technological upgrading, transparent calcium-zinc stabilizers are expected to account for more than 35% of the high-end PVC stabilizer market by 2025.

"Environmental compliance has become the bottom line for the survival of PVC enterprises, and transparency and high efficiency are the only way to high-end development," industry analysts said. Green additives represented by calcium-zinc stabilizers are promoting the transformation of China's PVC industry from "scale expansion" to "quality improvement," providing a "Chinese solution" for global plastic pollution control.