Przemysl Chemiczny, Vol.79, No.5, 165-168, 2000
Studies on purification of waste from 4,4 '-diaminodiphenylmethane production.
The waste from 4,4'-diaminodiphenylmethane (PMDA) production is characterized in this paper. The methods of its purification (extraction, ion-exchange, and adsorption on activated carbon) are proposed. From the economic point of view, the most advantageous is to carry out the extraction of aniline with use of technical PMDA, the flux, enriched in aniline, is further introduced to the unit of PMDA synthesis, and the distillate and water from final drying of PMDA are recycled. The concept has been applied to "Sopur", Bydgoszcz. The following results have been achieved: the COD number decreased by 60%, the waste quantity by 30%, and the concentration of chlorides in waste by 30%. The recovery of aniline reached the level of 5%. Adsorption on activated carbon requires the process of its regeneration, which strongly increases the purification costs. Because of the low rate of the bed regeneration and low yield of the process, the ions exchange on ion-exchangers is not suitable for commercial applications.