Consortium fiir Elektrochemische Industrie

WACKER Consortium fiir elektrochemische Industrie, Zielstattstrasse 20, 81379 Munich, Germany... 

Wacker Chemie AG, Consortium fiir elektrochemische Industrie, ZielstattstraBe 20-22, D-81379 Miinclien, Germany, elke.fritz-langhals wacker.com... 

Acknowledgments We want to thank the Consortium fiir Elektrochemische Industrie GmbH for financial support and the Wacker-Chemle for kindly providing various organosilanes as starting materials. 

O. Schaefer, A. Bauer, L. Brader, B. Pachaly, V. Frey, EP 1 195 379, Consortium fiir elektrochemische Industrie GmbH. 

Research to convert ethylene directly to acetaldehyde was begun in 1956 at the Consortium fiir Elektrochemische Industrie G.m.b.H., a subsidiary of Wacker Chemie G.m.b.H., under the direction of J. Smidt. The results of this research were summarized (34, 35) in two fundamental publications and in numerous patents. Smidt and co-workers first surveyed the open literature to determine what approaches had been used to oxidize ethylene and what the resulting oxidation products were. Table III summarizes the pertinent literature findings up to 1956. None of the processes published offered much promise for converting ethylene to acetaldehyde directly. In their initial experiments, Smidt et al. (34) passed mixtures of ethylene, oxygen, and hydrogen over a catalyst of palladium deposited on activated carbon, obtaining traces of acetaldehyde. They also found that the acetaldehyde yield was increased when... 

The liquid-phase oxidation of ethylene to acetaldehyde was pioneered by the Consortium fiir Elektrochemische Industrie G.m.b.H. Industrially, the single-stage process was developed mainly by Farbwerke Hoechst A. G. and the two-stage process by Wacker Chemie G.m.b.H. itself. Both processes are licensed by Aldehyd G.m.b.H., jointly owned by Wacker Chemie G.m.b.H. and Farbwerke Hoechst G.m.b.H. The basic patents of these two companies on the Wacker process are listed in Table IV. In addition to these patents, which have given Wacker Chemie G.m.b.H. and Farbwerke Hoechst a dominant role in this field, other companies hold some patents in this area (Table X). How many of the patents listed in Tables IX and X are commercially important cannot be judged, based on the open literature alone. 

Table IX. Principal Patents of the Wacker Process Issued to Consortium fiir Elektrochemische Industrie G.m.b.H. and to Farbwerke Hoechst A.G.

Consortium fiir elektrochemische Industrie GmbH (E. Baum, H. Deutsch, W. Herrmann, M. Magadan), DE 403.784 (1921). 

Consortium fiir elektrochemische Industrie GmbH, Central Research Company of Wacker-Chemie GmbH, Zielstattstr. 20, 81379 Munich, Germany Tel. +49 89 748 44221 — Fax +49 89 748 44242 E-mail dieter.heldmann wacker.com... 

After World War II, when the big oil companies installed a large number of refineries in industriahzed countries, lower olefins, particularly ethylene, became available in large quantities. Chemical companies replaced successively their acetylene-based processes for the production of aliphatic C2, C4, and C3 compounds by much cheaper processes with ethylene as the feedstock. Researchers of the Consortium fiir elektrochemische Industrie GmbH, the research organization of Wacker Chemie GmbH, succeeded in finding a new process for the manufacture of the important industrial intermediate acetaldehyde from ethylene [1, 2]. 

The two-stage process has been developed by the research group of Wacker s Consortium fiir elektrochemische Industrie. While this group worked on the development of a single-stage process, Wacker had to realize that at the time and the site of the scheduled first commercial plant, oxygen was not available at a reasonable price. So, Wacker was forced to develop another version using air as the oxidant. 

Smidt, Hafner, W., Sedlmeier, Jira, R., and Riittinger, R. (1959) Consortium fiir Elektrochemische Industrie. DE Patent 1049845. 

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