Sumitomo Chemical Company, Limited

Hiroyuki Umida

Masami Fukao

Mitsuhisa Tamura

Masahiro Usui

Kiyoshi Iwanaga

Toshio Nakayama

Yasumoto Shimazu

Hirooki Nagaoka

A high purity &egr;-caprolactam is prepared by pouring a molten crude &egr;-caprolactam and a solvent comprising an aliphatic hydrocarbon and having a lower temperature than that of the crude &egr;-caprolactam, into a vessel and mixing them to obtain a first slurry containing a crystallized &egr;-caprolactam. The slurry is then subjected to a solid-liquid separation to obtain &egr;-caprolactam and a first liquid phase. This process can effectively remove impurities from a crude &egr;-caprolactam, which is obtained by for example, subjecting cyclohexanone oxime to the Beckmann rearrangement.

Process for producing &egr;-caprolactam

Any one material selected from (A) sec-butylbenzene substantially free from ethyl hydroperoxide, carboxylic acids and phenol, (B) sec-butylbenzene substantially free from styrenes and (C) sec-butylbenzene substantially free from methylbenzyl alcohol is oxidized to obtain sec-butylbenzene hydroperoxide, which is then decomposed to obtain phenol and methyl ethyl ketone.

Process for producing phenol and methyl ethyl ketone

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Niihama, Japan

Hiroyuki Umida