Product Overview
Monoethanolamine (MEA) ACS Grade is a clear, colorless liquid amine with a sharp ammonia-like odor, stocked and shipped daily from our Taylor, TX warehouse. It works two jobs at once: it is a base strong enough for pH adjustment and neutralization, and an amino alcohol reactive enough to serve as a building block in synthesis. That combination is why it shows up on the shelf of an analytical lab, a water-treatment plant, and a metalworking-fluid blender in the same week.
This is the ACS Grade material — the tier laboratories specify when trace impurities would show up in their results. Buyers include HPLC analysts, water-treatment operators, formulators of surfactant systems, and process teams using MEA as a synthesis intermediate. Every order ships in DOT-compliant Class 8 packaging with the SDS included.
Why This Concentration
ACS Grade means this MEA is supplied at laboratory purity rather than a workhorse technical cut. For analytical work — mobile-phase preparation, reagent use, method development — that matters, because contaminants in a lower-grade amine can bleed into baselines and skew results. For synthesis, a cleaner starting material means fewer side reactions to chase downstream.
The trade-off is handling, not chemistry. Undiluted MEA is corrosive (per the product's GHS classification), attacks copper, brass, and rubber, and demands amine-compatible transfer equipment. If your process ultimately runs on a dilute amine solution, the practical approach is to buy this concentrated grade and dilute to your working strength on site — you control the final concentration and you pay to ship less water. If your application is purely industrial-scale pH adjustment where trace-metal specs are irrelevant, ACS Grade still works; it is simply more purity than the job requires.
Chemical Profile
Monoethanolamine (CAS 141-43-5) has the formula C2H7NO and a molecular weight of 61.08. It is a clear, colorless liquid with an unpleasant, ammonia-like odor you will notice the moment a drum bung is opened. With a density of 1.016 at 68 °F, it is slightly denser than water and will sink before mixing. It is highly water-soluble — 100 mg/mL or greater at 68 °F — which is what makes it practical to dilute to working strengths. Vapor pressure is low at room temperature, 0.4 mmHg at 68 °F, rising to 6 mmHg at 140 °F, so vapor exposure climbs quickly in warm storage or heated processes. Flash point is 185 °F. The liquid is corrosive to tissue, may attack copper, brass, and rubber, and produces toxic oxides of nitrogen in a fire — all reasons material compatibility checks come before the first transfer.
Industrial Applications
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HPLC mobile phase: analytical labs use MEA as a mobile-phase component in reversed-phase HPLC, where it modifies the mobile phase to sharpen separations of organic compounds. This is the application where ACS Grade earns its price — impurities in the amine become artifacts in the chromatogram.
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Water-treatment pH adjustment: as a base, MEA raises and holds pH in industrial water-treatment circuits. Operators feed it to neutralize acidity and keep systems in their target pH band.
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Corrosion inhibition: blenders formulate MEA into metalworking fluids and other industrial fluids, where the amine neutralizes acidic species and helps protect ferrous surfaces in service.
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Surfactant systems: MEA reacts with fatty acids to form amine soaps and serves as a surfactant component in cleaning and personal-care formulations, contributing detergency and emulsification.
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Chemical intermediate: as a primary amine and an alcohol in one molecule, MEA is a versatile building block in organic synthesis, including pharmaceutical intermediate work.
Handling & Storage
Treat this product as the corrosive it is. The signal word is Danger (per the product's GHS classification), and the hazard statements are specific: causes severe skin burns and eye damage (H314); harmful if swallowed (H302), in contact with skin (H312), or if inhaled (H332); and may cause respiratory irritation (H335) (per the product's GHS classification). Chemical-splash goggles, amine-resistant gloves, and body-covering PPE are the baseline; work with ventilation adequate to keep the ammonia-like vapor down, especially anywhere the material runs warm.
Store it cool and dry in HDPE or glass, sealed against moisture. Keep it away from copper, brass, and rubber in both storage and transfer lines — the amine attacks all three — and away from acids and other incompatible materials. Keep containers closed between uses; MEA picks up moisture from open air.
Hazmat & Shipping
This product ships as regulated hazardous material: UN2491, ETHANOLAMINE, Hazard Class 8, Packing Group III (per 49 CFR 172.101). We pack it in UN-spec packaging, mark and label each shipment, and tender it with correct shipping papers — the same Class 8 corrosive workflow our warehouse runs every day. Our shipping and handling guidance is reviewed by Andre Taki, DOT Hazmat Specialist. Alliance Chemical charges hazmat fees may apply.
Documentation
A Safety Data Sheet ships with every order and is available in English, Spanish, French, and Japanese. A lot-specific Certificate of Analysis is available for the material you receive, and a Technical Data Sheet documents the product specification. If your receiving, EHS, or QC process needs documents before the freight arrives, ask — we send them ahead.
Why Buy from Alliance Chemical
We are a hazmat distributor, not a broker. MEA ACS Grade sits in our Taylor, TX warehouse and ships daily in DOT-compliant packaging, from single quarts for the bench to 330-gallon totes for production. Our team physically packs Class 8 corrosives every day, our shipping guidance is reviewed by a DOT Hazmat Specialist, and orders come with the SDS in hand and a COA available for the lot. When you need the material to arrive correctly packaged, correctly papered, and on time, that operational discipline is the product.
