Effects of magnesium chloride on the properties of wood and non-wood fibrous paper sheets treated with sodium silicate.

This study examines the effects of using magnesium chloride as a precipitating agent of sodium silicate on the mechanical, optical and fire retardant properties of the resulting paper sheets. Two types of treatments (internal and external), were carried out to investigate such effects on the paper sheets prepared from wood pulp and from non-wood fibrous, bagasse pulp. The results obtained showed that the treatment of paper sheets with either sodium silicate or sodium silicate-magnesium chloride led to a decrease in the activation energy of the initial main degradation stages. Wood pulp-paper sheets treated with sodium silicate showed better fire retardant properties than the sodium silicate-magnesium chloride treated wood pulp-paper sheets. A reverse trend was noted in the case of paper sheets made from bagasse pulp. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]