Study on the synthesis of toluene-2,4-diisocyanate via amine and carbonyl fluoride

•Six main factors of the experimental conditions for the synthesis of TDI via amine and COF2 were studied and optimized.•The total yield of TDI based on TDA was raised to be 92.3%.•The influence of the excess COF2 left in the reaction system was studied in detail by a one-pot method.•The gap between the laboratory and the industrial application will be decreased quickly.

We presented recently a synthesis of toluene-2,4-diisocyanate (TDI) as one of the nine examples to verify the feasibility of an industrial appealing two-step method for isocyanates synthesis via amines and carbonyl fluoride (COF2). Because more investigation was considered to be necessary for future industrial application, the two-step synthesis processes of TDI were studied in detail herein. The total yield of TDI increased 5.6% under the optimized experimental conditions. The influence of the excess COF2 left in the reaction system was studied carefully according to a one-pot method.

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