Carbon is a black, fluffy, extremely fine, odourless powder. If impure, it may be a POSSIBLE DUST EXPLOSION HAZARD but the pure material can only be ignited with difficulty. Carbon black will burn slowly with production of carbon monoxide. Storage fires may go undetected for some time. It may give off nitrogen oxides and sulfur oxides in a fire. Carbon black is considered to be a POSSIBLE CANCER HAZARD - may cause cancer, based on animal data and a POSSIBLE MUTAGEN - may cause genetic damage, based on animal data.

Carbon blacks are powdered forms of highly dispersed elemental carbon manufactured by controlled vapour-phase pyrolysis of hydrocarbons. There are a number of different types of carbon black, produced by different industrial processes, including acetylene black, channel black, furnace black, lamp black and thermal black. Average particle diameters in several commercially-produced carbon blacks range from 0.01 to 0.4 micrometres (µm), while average aggregate diameters range from 0.1 to 0.8µm. Most types of carbon black contain over 97 to 99% elemental carbon. Carbon blacks may also contain chemically bound hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and sulfur. The oxygen content is of greatest importance for their application. Oxygen is bound to the surface in the form of mainly acidic or basic functional groups. Because of their source materials, the methods of their production and their large surface areas and surface characteristics, commercial carbon blacks typically contain varying quantities of adsorbed by-products from the production processes, particularly aromatic compounds. Typical classes of chemicals adsorbed onto the carbon black surface are carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), nitro derivatives of PAHs and sulfur-containing PAHs. The presence of these compounds can significantly increase the hazards of carbon black exposure.

It is used mainly as a reinforcing agent in rubber products such as tires, tubes, conveyer belts, cables and other mechanical rubber goods; used as a black pigment in printing, lithographic, letterpress, carbon paper and typewriter ribbon inks, paints, coatings, lacquers, plastics, fibres, ceramics, enamels, paper, record discs and photocopier toner; leather finishes; manufacture of dry-cell batteries, electrodes and carbon brushes; electrical conductors; conductive and antistatic rubber and plastic products; electromagnetic interference shielding; videodiscs and tapes; uv stabilization of polyolefins; and high temperature insulating material.

Carbon black is also known as acetylene black, channel black, furnace black, lamp black, lampblack, thermal black, and noir de carbone.

Its CAS Registry Number is 1333-86-4. This number is assigned by the Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) in the United States and is used as a unique identifier number world-wide.