Where is acrylonitrile found

In water, acrylonitrile usually breaks down in about 1 to 2 weeks, although this can vary depending on conditions. For example, high concentrations of acrylonitrile such as might occur after a spill tend to be broken down more slowly. In one case, measurable amounts of acrylonitrile were found in nearby wells 1 year after a spill. Unless you live near a factory where acrylonitrile is made or near a hazardous waste site that contains acrylonitrile, you are unlikely to be exposed to acrylonitrile in the air you breathe or the water you drink.

Concentrations of acrylonitrile in average air samples are too low to be measured, and most water samples also have no measurable acrylonitrile.

Measurable amounts of acrylonitrile are found primarily near factories and hazardous waste sites. Concentrations in the air near a factory producing or using acrylonitrile average less than 1 part per billion ppb. Extremely small amounts of acrylonitrile may be found in water near some factories that make or use it, but acrylonitrile rapidly breaks down and disappears from water. Plastic food containers that are made from acrylonitrile are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration FDA such that only 0.

Because acrylonitrile has been found in water and soil in some hazardous waste sites that contain this chemical, residents living very close to waste sites might possibly be exposed to acrylonitrile by breathing the air or drinking contaminated groundwater.

Acrylonitrile can enter your body if you breathe its vapors or eat or drink acrylonitrile-contaminated food or water. Acrylonitrile can pass through your skin, but how much gets through is not known.

Inside the body, acrylonitrile is broken down into other chemicals, including cyanide. Most of these breakdown products are removed from the body in the urine. The effects of acrylonitrile on your health depend on how much you take into your body and whether you are exposed for a short or long period of time. If the levels of acrylonitrile are high enough, or if the exposure is for a long enough period of time, acrylonitrile can cause death. Small children are more likely to be affected than adults.

In several cases, children died following exposures that adults found only mildly irritating. It should be noted that specific levels of acrylonitrile causing death were not reported. Exposure to large amounts of acrylonitrile for a short period of time, as might occur in the case of an industrial accident, results mainly in effects on the nervous system.

Symptoms can include headache and nausea. At higher concentrations of acrylonitrile there may be temporary damage to red blood cells and the liver. These symptoms disappear when the exposure is stopped. Direct contact of your skin with acrylonitrile will damage the skin so that it may blister and peel. Exposure of the skin to high concentrations of acrylonitrile in the air may irritate the skin and cause it to turn red. The redness may last for several days.

The U. Department of Health and Human Services has determined that acrylonitrile may reasonably be anticipated to be a carcinogen. Longterm exposure to acrylonitrile in air or water may increase your chances of getting cancer. Humans who are repeatedly exposed to acrylonitrile in the workplace for many years may have a higher-thanaverage chance of developing lung cancer, although this is not clearly established.

In animals, exposure to acrylonitrile in the air or in drinking water has been found to increase the number of tumors occurring in the brain, salivary glands, and intestines. Birth defects have been seen in animals exposed to high concentrations of acrylonitrile in the air or drinking water.

Reproductive effects have been seen in animals given acrylonitrile in drinking water for three generations. However, no birth defects or effects on reproduction have been reported in humans. There is a test that can detect acrylonitrile in blood. In addition, the major breakdown products of acrylonitrile by the body termed metabolites can be measured in urine. Some breakdown products that can be measured are specific to acrylonitrile. However, one breakdown product of the body cyanide that is commonly measured is not specific to acrylonitrile exposure, and the results can be affected by cigarette smoking.

Because special equipment is needed, these tests cannot be performed routinely in your doctor's office. There is not enough information at present to use the results of such tests to predict the nature or severity of any health effects that may result from exposure to acrylonitrile. In humans, breathing acrylonitrile at a concentration of 16 parts of acrylonitrile per million parts of air ppm causes headaches, nausea, and disorientation. This concentration is close to that at which acrylonitrile can be smelled in air about 21 ppm.

Milberger, James L. Callahan, Robert W. Foreman, James D. Idol, Jr. Ross, were involved in this development effort. In the team began testing oxidants as direct oxidation catalysts. In an experiment designed by Jim Callahan and performed by Emily Ross, bismuth phosphomolybdate produced acrolein in yields of 40 percent or more. This was a first-magnitude discovery: propylene to acrolein in a single catalytic reaction step.

Acrylic acid could be made in a subsequent step. Callahan, Foreman and Veatch secured key patents on the bismuth phosphomolybdate catalyst, and from then on, things were destined to happen fast.

Jim Idol suggested acrylonitrile as a derivative of acrylic acid and successfully carried out catalytic conversion of the ammonium salt of acrylic acid.

Next, acrylonitrile was made by feeding acrolein, ammonia and air over the catalyst that produced acrylic acid from acrolein. This success suggested that acrylonitrile might be made directly from propylene by carrying out the entire reaction in a single step with bismuth phosphomolybdate. The experiment, designed by Idol and performed by Evelyn Jonak in March, , resulted in ammoxidation, a process that produced acrylonitrile in about 50 percent yield with acetonitrile and hydrogen cyanide as co-products.

With the capacity to make acrolein, acrylic acid and acrylonitrile by efficient, revolutionary new processes, Veatch pressed for a strong development and commercialization effort. The Patents and Licensing Department went to work on securing an iron-clad patent position. Because manufacturing both acrylic acid and acrylonitrile proved to be too ambitious, acrylonitrile production became the priority.

Sohio's process economics for acrylonitrile were so positive that the decision was made to proceed with commercialization even though early market development efforts were discouraging.

Major users were unsure that Sohio acrylonitrile would satisfy their needs. One major chemical company declined an opportunity for a joint venture. Still, Sohio commissioned the design of a detailed acrylonitrile plant. A pilot plant was constructed under the direction of Gordon G.

Cross at Sohio's new laboratory in Warrensville Heights, a Cleveland suburb, where Ernie Milberger was instrumental in designing large laboratory-scale reactors and obtaining process design and development data from them. In a bold move, it was decided to design the commercial plant on the basis of bench-scale laboratory development data rather than wait for pilot plant results.

The time gained by eliminating this stage of development offset the added risk. Milberger's bench-scale unit, which required about four pounds of catalyst, generated the key data for the design of commercial reactors holding 40 tons.

By early , the commercial design was going forward under the direction of Edward F. Morrill; a pilot plant was in operation; the catalyst was in final development by Callahan and his team with provisions for large-scale manufacture; and advancement work on reactor operation, product purification, and waste disposal was being coordinated.

A key innovation was the successful development of a fluidized bed catalyst to allow for removal of the heat produced by the ammoxidation reaction. In less than four years since the discovery of bismuth phosphomolybdate as the direct propylene oxidation catalyst and the discovery of propylene ammoxidation, a full-scale commercial plant designed to produce There was but one challenge left—an economic one.

Soon after Sohio's entry, a major manufacturer cut its price in half. Sohio met the lower price and still managed to make a profit. The competitor scrapped its own expansion plans and took a license from Sohio. Other acrylonitrile producers soon became licensees of the Sohio process, and within a few years, acetylene-based acrylonitrile production had been replaced by the Sohio process.

To gain a larger share of the overall market, Sohio decided to promote the licensing of the process rather than keep the manufacturing to itself. Sohio's license to The People's Republic of China in was the first transaction by an American company after China opened its doors to U.

Annual worldwide production of acrylonitrile has grown from million pounds in to more than Since several improved catalyst formulations have been developed, most of them based on the original bismuth phosphomolybdate catalyst.

Franklin Veatch was research supervisor for petro-chemicals, polymers, and new petroleum processes. He possessed a technical, creative genius, and he inspired co-workers to achieve a goal, however impossible it might seem. Veatch received his B. He held 61 U. He died in James L. Callahan , a research associate, coordinated catalyst research and development, including the discovery of improved methods of catalyst manufacture.

He was renowned for converting hydrocarbon materials to petrochemicals. Callahan received his B. Retired since , he is credited with more than patents and publications. Edward F. Morrill , as president of Vistron Corp. Vistron was the chemical division of Sohio from to Morrill received his bachelor's degree in civil engineering from Case Institute of Technology in Morrill took the necessary risks that led to successful commercialization.

James D. He received his B. Ernest C. Milberger , a research associate, carried out the advancement of the Sohio process from small-scale research to pilot plant.