Abstract:Long-chain fatty acid sodium salts have high Krafft temperature (KT) and poor tolerance to inorganic salts, which is not conducive to their usages in low temperature and salt-containing systems. Therefore, dodecanoic acid (C12) were associated with trimethylamine (TMA), dimethylethylamine (DMA), methyldiethylamine (MDA), triethylamine (TEN), tetramethylenediamine (TMEDA), dimethylethanolamine (DMEA), methyldiethanolamine (MDEA), triethanolamine (TEA) to obtain counterion coupled surfactants of C12-TMA, C12-DMA, C12-MDA, C12-TEN, C12-TMEDA, C12-DMEA, C12-MDEA and C12-TEA. Both KT and NaCl tolerability were measured. The results showed that KT of C12-TMA, C12-DMA, C12-MDA, C12-TEN, C12-TMEDA and C12-DMEA were lower than that of sodium dodecanoate (C12-Na). The KT of C12-TMA, C12-DMA, C12-MDA, C12-TEN and C12-TMEDA were lower than 46 ℃ when the mass concentration of NaCl (ρNaCl) was 25.0 g/L. The appropriate amount of NaCl improved the stability of emulsions formed respectively by C12-Na, C12-TEN and C12-TMEDA solutions with dodecane, but excessive NaCl caused surfactants flocculation. The flocculation of C12-TEN and C12-TMEDA occurred when ρNaCl was 23.0 g/L, which was 53% higher than that of C12-Na (15.0 g/L). Fatty acid amines did have better NaCl tolerance than their sodium salts.