Abstract
One of the factors which encouraged us to search for very mild liquefaction conditions was the reported existence of a variety of catalysts capable of causing the hydrogenation of aromatics at room temperature or slightly above and at hydrogen pressures of one or two atm. A number of such systems are described in James book. (Homogeneous Hydrogentation by B. R. James). Each promising system was tested with coal; nothing worked. Intermolecular hydride transfer from a variety of compounds to carbonium ions is a well known, well studied reaction and has been reviewed. The reaction developed uses BF/sub 3/.H/sub 2/O as the acid and Et/sub 3/SiH as the hydride donor. The organic compound to be reduced is protonated by the BF/sub 3/.H/sub 2/O to give a carbonium ion which then hydride abstracts from the Et/sub 3/SiH. Thus, half of the hydrogen introduced comes from water and the other half from the hydride donor. Two features of this reaction exist. One, it is a very mild reduction of aromatics which should find synthetic utility. Second, some sulfur is removed from coals under very mild conditions together with some conversion of bituminous coals.
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