The world's leading calcium carbide supplier.
UN 1402 Calcium Carbide Explained: What Buyers Must Know Before Importing
Importing calcium carbide is less about chemistry and more about discipline. In the dangerous goods system, it typically ships as:
UN 1402
Class 4.3, "dangerous when wet"
Packing Group II, in many trade lanes
Sea freight under the IMDG Code for most commercial volumes
That label does not mean the cargo "randomly catches fire". The real problem is moisture. Let water in, even a little, and the reaction can accelerate quickly, releasing acetylene and raising the risk of flash fire.
UN 1402 is the rulebook for the whole shipment
Treat UN 1402 like a paperwork detail and the chain will correct you.
Booking desks, terminals, DG yards, carriers, and brokers will all check the same identifiers. If they do not match across documents, your shipment does not "mostly work". It stops.
Core fields that must be consistent:
UN/ID number: UN 1402
Proper Shipping Name: CALCIUM CARBIDE
Class: 4.3
Packing Group: II (as declared for your shipment)
Most delays come from inconsistency, not missing files. An invoice that uses one naming style, an SDS that uses another, a forwarder template that defaults to a different entry. One mismatch is enough to trigger rework, re-submission, and lost time at the port.
Why Class 4.3 creates trouble: water, humidity, condensation
With UN 1402, the risk concentrates in places buyers underestimate:
Packaging: not "drums or bags", but whether the sealing and moisture barrier survive sea freight conditions.
Handling: rain during unloading, damp warehouse floors, temporary outdoor staging, condensation inside the container.
Abnormal events: damaged packages, suspected moisture ingress, leaks. If you do not have an SOP, people improvise.
A simple question is worth asking: do you control moisture as carefully as you control price?
Packaging: audit the moisture system, not the packaging type
You do not need to be a packaging engineer. You do need clear answers.
Ask your supplier:
1. Is the outer package a UN performance package suitable for the declared packing group, and can you show the UN marking/proof?
2. What is the sealing system, exactly (lid, gasket, liner), and how do you prevent moisture ingress after handling?
3. What moisture-control measures do you use during stuffing (dry process, elevation, barriers, desiccants where appropriate)?
4. Can you provide loading photos showing seals, UN markings, palletizing, and basic weather protection?
If answers stay vague, expect problems to show up when nobody has time to solve them.
Make rain a hard stop
Many incidents and claims happen at destination, during the last mile.
Write these rules into your warehouse SOP and enforce them:
No de-stuffing or opening in rain. If unavoidable, do it under covered, controlled conditions.
Any damaged or suspect packages: isolate immediately. Do not move them into normal storage "temporarily".
Keep handling zones dry, including hidden risks like floor washing, hoses, sprinklers, and condensation drips.
It sounds strict. It is simply aligned with the hazard logic: keep it dry.
With calcium carbide, the spec sheet is only half the deal. The other half lives in small, unglamorous details, like whether a drum stays bone-dry after a humid night at the port, and whether your DG paperwork lines up so cleanly that nobody feels tempted to kick it back for "clarification". If you have ever watched a booking stall because one field in the declaration did not match the SDS wording, you know how quickly a simple purchase turns into a chain of emails.
We have been exporting calcium carbide for 19 years, and that time teaches you a certain kind of caution. UN 1402 cargo gets inspected. It gets questioned. Sometimes it gets rejected for reasons that look trivial on paper and expensive in real life. So we do not treat documents and packing as an afterthought. We build them into the shipment. We assemble a complete DG document set, keep the SDS and shipping description speaking the same language, and align everything with current IMDG requirements. On the packing side, we think in terms of moisture barriers and real handling conditions, not a lazy "it is in a drum, it will be fine" mindset.
Work with us and you are not just buying calcium carbide. You are buying a shipment that has been set up to move, not to argue. Fewer surprises at the carrier desk. Fewer headaches at the terminal. A cleaner handover at your warehouse. Your team spends less time chasing corrections and more time doing what they actually get paid for, keeping production running.