Basf Aktiengesellschaft

Wolfgang Gebert

Peter Magnussen

Volker Schumacher

Werner Praetorius

Heinrich Reitz

In a process for the continuous preparation of adipic acid by hydrolysis of C.sub.1 -C.sub.4 -alkyl adipates with water at an elevated temperature in the presence of a strongly acidic ion exchanger, the improvement that the esters and excess water are fed to the middle section of a column, reaction mixture is taken off at a plurality of trays of the column below the feed point, passed over a strongly acidic ion exchanger and recycled, alkanols or alkanol/water mixtures are taken off at the top of the column and an aqueous solution of adipic acid is taken off at the bottom of the column.

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Wesseling, Germany

Wolfgang Gebert