Sodium bicarbonate looks like the simplest chemical on the price list - baking soda, NaHCO₃, CAS 144-55-8 - and that simplicity is exactly why grade mistakes are common. The wrong specification is rarely dangerous; it is just quietly expensive, either because you overpaid for certificates your application never needed, or because a food buyer rejected a lot that was fine chemically but thin on paperwork.
The Three Buying Situations
- Food and feed: leavening in baked goods, pH control in beverages, feed supplement. This is certificate territory: the COA must cover heavy metals individually, and buyers in most markets expect food-additive compliance, not just a 99% assay line.
- General industry: textile dyeing, detergents, fire-extinguishing powder, water conditioning. Industrial grade at 99% minimum does the job; certificate requirements drop to COA and MSDS.
- Flue gas desulfurization: the fastest-growing use. Dry injection of fine-milled bicarbonate removes SO₂ and acid gases; here the buyer cares about reactivity and particle size after milling, which ordinary food or industrial specs do not capture - discuss the application specifically.
COA Items Worth Watching
- Assay: 99% minimum is standard across grades; the differences live below that line.
- Chlorides: matter for food and pharma, irrelevant for FGD.
- Heavy metals: specified individually for food grade - arsenic and lead are the items that trip shipments.
- Moisture and bulk density: the items that decide how the powder flows through your pneumatic system; ask for them even on industrial lots.
Packing That Matches the Use
DSC Trading packs 25 kg PP bags for both grades, with 1000 kg jumbo bags available - the jumbo option is standard for FGD plants that blow the powder straight from bulk handling. Brands include DSC, HAITIAN, HAIHUA, YUHUA, YINQIAO and MALAN, so buyers can match the producer to the destination market's expectations.
State the end use, not just the grade, when you inquire - "food grade for bakery export to the Gulf" and "industrial grade for detergent blending" get different COA packages and different prices, and the conversation is shorter when the application is on the table from the first message.