Reactivity Documentation
Metals, Less Reactive |
mixed with |
Epoxides |
Summary
- Explosive: Reaction products may be explosive or sensitive to shock or friction
- Intense or explosive reaction: Reaction may be particularly intense, violent, or explosive
Details
Reactivity Predictions (for each pair of reactive groups)
Epoxides
Hazard Predictions
- Explosive: Reaction products may be explosive or sensitive to shock or friction
- Intense or explosive reaction: Reaction may be particularly intense, violent, or explosive
Mercury, silver, copper, and their alloys can react with acetylene at room temperature to form explosive metal acetylides, which can ignite ethylene oxide. Since acetylene is a common contaminant in ethylene oxide, these metals should be kept away from ethylene oxide (MCA Safety Datasheet 38, Manufacturing Chemists' Association, Washington, 1971).
Pure ethylene oxide vapor at 101.3 kPa (1 atm) decomposes when passed through a platinum coil heated to 571 C. The decomposition temperature decreases with increasing pressure of ethylene oxide (Rebsdat, S. and Mayer, D. 2001. Ethylene Oxide. Ullmann's Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry. (Online)).
At elevated temperatures (190-300 C), silver catalyzes the isomerization of ethylene oxide to acetaldehyde (Rebsdat, S. and Mayer, D. 2001. Ethylene Oxide. Ullmann's Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry. (Online)).