Thermal runaway hazards of tert-butyl hydroperoxide by calorimetric studies

Thermal runaway reactions associated with exothermic behaviors of tert-butyl hydroperoxide (TBHP) solutions and TBHP reacting with alkaline contaminants were studied. A differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) was used to characterize these inherent behaviors of TBHP solutions with KOH, NaOH, LiOH and NH4OH. The exothermic peak in thermal curves of TBHP solutions with different alkali were detected by DSC thermal analysis. By thermal analysis, we compared various heats of decomposition of TBHP solutions with alkaline impurities, and determined the incompatible hazards of various TBHP solutions with alkaline contaminants. Comparing with TBHP in various diluents, the adiabatic runaway reaction via vent sizing package 2 (VSP2) indicated that aqueous TBHP intrinsically possesses the phenomena of thermal explosion with dramatic self-reactive rate and pressure rise under adiabatic conditions. Many commercial organic peroxides may have different hazard behaviors. Therefore, using thermal method to classify the hazards is an important subject.