In 1946, the United Kingdom published the first patent for the preparation of PET, and in 1949, the British ICI company completed the pilot test. However, after the purchase of the patent by the American DuPont Company, a production device was established in 1953, which was the first in the world to achieve industrial production. In the early days, PET was almost always used for synthetic fibers (commonly known as polyester and Dacron in my country). Since the 1980s, PET has made breakthrough development as an engineering plastic, and nucleating agents and crystallization accelerators have been developed successively. At present, PET and PBT are thermoplastic polyesters and have become one of the five major engineering plastics.
PET is divided into fiber-grade polyester chips and non-fiber-grade polyester chips. ①Fiber-grade polyester is used to make polyester staple fibers and polyester filaments, and is the raw material for polyester fiber companies to process fibers and related products. Polyester is the largest variety of chemical fiber. ②Non-fiber-grade polyester also has uses such as bottles and films, and is widely used in packaging, electronics, medical and health, construction, automobiles and other fields. Among them, packaging is the largest non-fiber application market for polyester, and it is also the fastest growing field for PET.