Storage nitrates

It is prepared by the direct nitration of toluene with a mixture of nitric and sulphuric acids. TNT is a very stable, violent and powerful high explosive, but less sensitive to shock and friction than picric acid. It is widely used as a filling for shells, bombs, etc. often mixed with ammonium nitrate and other high explosives. The lower grades of TNT may contain isomers which under hot storage conditions may give rise to exudation. 

Amino-4 -methylthiazole slowly decomposes on storage to a red viscous mass. It can be stored as the nitrate, which is readily deposited as pink crystals when dilute nitric acid is added to a cold ethanolic solution of the thiazole. The nitrate can be recrystallised from ethanol, although a faint pink colour persists. Alternatively, water can be added dropwise to a boiling suspension of the nitrate in acetone until the solution is just clear charcoal is now added and the solution, when boiled for a short time, filtered and cooled, deposits the colourless crystalline nitrate, m.p. 192-194° (immersed at 185°). The thiazole can be regenerated by decomposing the nitrate with aqueous sodium hydroxide, and extracting the free base with ether as before. 

Fertili r Grade yimmonium Nitrate Properties and Recommended Methodsfor Packaging, Handling, Transportation, Storage and Use, The Fertilizer Institute, Washington, D.C., p. 24. 

Many stabilizer systems have been tailored to a particular industry need or for particular areas where dilution water quaUty is poor. These grades are heavily stabilized and may contain organic sequestering agents, ie, staimate, phosphates, and nitrate ions, so that the weak solutions produced by dilution from hard water retain acceptable stabihty. The nitrate is not a stabilizer, but it inhibits corrosion of aluminum storage tanks by chloride ion. 

When nickel hydroxide is oxidized at the nickel electrode in alkaline storage batteries the black trivalent gelatinous nickel hydroxide oxide [12026-04-9], Ni(0H)0, is formed. In nickel battery technology, nickel hydroxide oxide is known as the nickel active mass (see Batteries, secondary cells). Nickel hydroxide nitrate [56171-41-6], Ni(0H)N02, and nickel chloride hydroxide [25965-88-2], NiCl(OH), are frequently mentioned as intermediates for the production of nickel powder in aqueous solution. The binding energies for these compounds have been studied (55). 

Sohd ammonium nitrate occurs in five different crystalline forms (19) (Table 6) detectable by time—temperature cooling curves. Because all phase changes involve either shrinkage or expansion of the crystals, there can be a considerable effect on the physical condition of the sohd material. This is particularly tme of the 32.3°C transition point which is so close to normal storage temperature during hot weather. 

Decomposition and Detonation Hazard. Ammonium nitrate is considered a very stable salt, even though ammonium salts of strong acids generally lose ammonia and become slightly acidic on storage. For ammonium nitrate, endothermic dissociation from lowering pH occurs above 169°C. 

Exothermic Decompositions These decompositions are nearly always irreversible. Sohds with such behavior include oxygen-containing salts and such nitrogen compounds as azides and metal styphnates. When several gaseous products are formed, reversal would require an unlikely complex of reactions. Commercial interest in such materials is more in their storage properties than as a source of desirable products, although ammonium nitrate is an important explosive. A few typical exampes will be cited to indicate the ranges of reaction conditions. They are taken from the review by Brown et al. ( Reactions in the Solid State, in Bamford and Tipper, Comprehensive Chemical Kinetics, vol. 22, Elsevier, 1980). 

On the completion of nitration the batch is dropped from the reaction vessel into a centrifuge and the acid mixture spun off and recovered. The nitrated linters, which still contain appreciable quantities of acid, are then plunged into a drowning tank, where the nitric acid is diluted with a large volume of water. The resultant ester is then pumped, as a slurry, into storage vats which may hold the products of several nitrations. 

Ammonium nitrate is made at Fisons Ltd and stored in solution in two heated tanks to prevent ciystalization. One tank holds 3,100 tonnes and the other 6,200 tonnes of 92% aqueous ammonium nitrate solution. Trains laden with oil refinery products from the Mobil and Shell refineries pass the factory on a near embankment. A derailment could spill and ignite hydrocarbons from a rail tank car to explode an ammonium nitrate storage tank. Suggestions were made to mitigate or prevent such a domino effect... 

Grind 5 g mercury(I) nitrate dihydrate with 100 ml water in a mortar and tranfer it to a storage vessel along with the sediment the supernatant is fit for use as long as the sediment remains white [1],... 

---