Vapor phase nitration of butane in a molten salt reactor

Abstract

In this work, butane was nitrated continuously in the vapor phase using a molten salt reactor. Molten salt temperature was varied from 371^C to 482*^0; mole ratio of hydrocarbon to nitric acid from 3.4 to 7.8; and residence time from 0.5 to 0.7 seconds. A statistical design was used to prevent the presence of a linear time trend from affecting comparisons between the dif ferent levels of each variable. Nitroparaffin yields based on hydrocarbon consumed ranged from 26.7% to 84.3%, while conversions based on hydrocarbon fed ranged from 0.86% to 7.3%. Nitroparaffin yields based on nitric acid consumed ranged from 38.7% to 74.4%, while conversions based on nitric acid fed ranged from 8.8% to 30.7%. The mole per cent distribution of the nitroparaffins pro duced ranged as follows: nitromethane, 5.