Activated carbonates facilitate the preparation of polycarbonates based on monomers that are unsuitable for traditional melt polymerization at high temperatures. Bis(methyl salicyl) carbonate (BMSC) clearly shows reactivity benefits over diphenyl carbonate in melt polymerization reactions, resulting in shorter reaction times and reduced heat exposure during polymerization. The increased reactivity enables the melt polymerization of a wide range of monomers, as demonstrated by two examples using volatile resorcinol and sterically hindered tert-butyl hydroquinone as monomers in the preparation of (co) polycarbonates.

Microphase separation of bio-based soft blocks in a hard isosorbide polycarbonate enabled the preparation of a transparent bio-based engineering plastic with improved mechanical properties and processability at milder conditions. The ability to process these isosorbide-containing polycarbonates at lower temperatures in combination with a lower polymerization temperature due to the use of the activated bis(methyl salicyl) carbonate as the carbonate source avoided the undesired elimination of β-hydrogens, which is commonly observed in isosorbide-containing polymers. Preparation of a wide range of custom samples with varying combinations of soft blocks, followed by characterization and statistical analysis, enabled the identification of the correlations between composition and mechanical and thermal properties, resulting in an optimized engineering plastic with facile processing, transparency, and ductility combined with >84% renewable content.

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