Carbon Disulfide

Abstract

Carbon disulfide, CS 2 , is a highly volatile, flammable, clear, colorless, dense liquid that has many useful chemical and physical properties. An industrially important chemical for over one hundred years, most carbon disulfide is now produced by reaction of hydrocarbon gas with sulfur in a process developed in the 1950s, although many small capacity plants still employ a retort or electric furnace route based on wood charcoal and sulfur. Modern plants achieve a 99.99% pure carbon disulfide product by means of fractional distillation. Over 75% of the estimated one million tons of carbon disulfide produced worldwide in 1991 went into manufacturing viscose rayon and cellophane film. Carbon disulfide is also used in manufacturing numerous organic sulfur compounds for a variety of applications including rubber vulcanization accelerators, flotation chemicals, pharmaceutical intermediates, fungicides, and insecticides. The carbon disulfide process route to carbon tetrachloride was discontinued in the United States during 1991 because of environment pressures on the end product. Carbon disulfide is very toxic, and the U.S. Government limits the 8‐h time‐weighted average exposure to 4 ppm maximum (12 mg/m 3 ) in air. Health and environmental concerns related to carbon disulfide have curtailed some uses, such as in grain fumigants and solvents. Special precautions must be exercised in handling carbon disulfide because of its toxicity, high volatility, wide flammability range, and low ignition temperature.