Process for the recovery of antimony pentachloride from used catalyst solutions

Abstract

Disclosed is a process for the recovery of antimony pentachloride from catalyst solutions used in the fluorination of chlorinated hydrocarbons characterized in that the exhausted catalyst solution containing antimony ions and high boiling halogenated hydrocarbons is chlorinated to convert the Sb.sup.3.sup.+ to Sb.sup.5.sup.+ followed by treatment of the solution with hydrogen fluoride to give SbCl.sub.x F.sub.y compounds, wherein x is 4-2 and y is 1-3, the sum of x+y being 5, and to convert the high boiling halogenated hydrocarbons to lower boiling halogenated hydrocarbons, thereafter removing the halogenated hydrocarbons having a lower boiling temperature than the boiling point of SbCl.sub.x F.sub.y and converting the remaining SbCl.sub.x F.sub.y compound with carbon tetrachloride to form antimony pentachloride which is thereafter separated from the remaining organic compounds and inorganic residue.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.