Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Barium peroxide from barium carbonate

Chemgineer - 3-7-2023 at 12:14

Is it possible to react hydrogen peroxide with barium carbonate and precipitate barium peroxide?

Or is the lack of solubility in water a major stopper?

I could obviously produce barium nitrate first and then add the peroxide.

Tsjerk - 3-7-2023 at 12:21

See the second preparation:

https://www.prepchem.com/synthesis-of-barium-peroxide/

Chemgineer - 3-7-2023 at 12:32

Quote: Originally posted by Tsjerk  
See the second preparation:

https://www.prepchem.com/synthesis-of-barium-peroxide/


So realistically my first step is to reduce my barium carbonate to barium oxide?

Tsjerk - 3-7-2023 at 12:35

There is a second preparation in there.

You want to get it into solution to get to the hydroxide, don't know how to do that, but from there it is easy.


Barium nitrate with sodium hydroxide?

[Edited on 3-7-2023 by Tsjerk]

clearly_not_atara - 3-7-2023 at 16:17

Nitrate? I think that acetate might be a little simpler!

Rainwater - 4-7-2023 at 00:57

https://youtu.be/LB2pO7OteDU
Here is one thats been on my todo list for a while.
They use barium nitrate, do to the much lower decomposition tempature

[Edited on 4-7-2023 by Rainwater]

Chemgineer - 4-7-2023 at 09:09

Quote: Originally posted by Rainwater  
https://youtu.be/LB2pO7OteDU
Here is one thats been on my todo list for a while.
They use barium nitrate, do to the much lower decomposition tempature

[Edited on 4-7-2023 by Rainwater]


Ok so with the second method I can react my barium carbonate with hcl to get barium chloride,

Then double displacement with sodium hydroxide to get barium hydroxide.

Then finally react this with hydrogen peroxide to precipitate barium peroxide.

Sounds fairly straight forward.

Tsjerk - 4-7-2023 at 09:51

Sodium nitrate and sodium acetate are much more soluble than sodium chloride, so if you have nitric acid or acetic acid I would use those instead of hydrochloric acid.

Chemgineer - 4-7-2023 at 10:41

Quote: Originally posted by Tsjerk  
Sodium nitrate and sodium acetate are much more soluble than sodium chloride, so if you have nitric acid or acetic acid I would use those instead of hydrochloric acid.


Ok nitrate is a good idea because I can additionally recover the nitrate as potassium nitrate by adding kcl to my final waste solution.

Chemgineer - 5-7-2023 at 15:28

So i've had a go at this...

200g of barium carbonate
168ml of 50% nitric acid

I added the nitric acid to a 1000ml beaker and then topped it up to 800ml with distilled water.
I gradually added the barium carbonate until the solution was PH neural.
Next I filtered the solution through a good coffee filter.
I got a nice clear solution of barium nitrate.

Next I dissolved 165g of sodium hydroxide in 200ml of distilled water slowly to avoid boiling.

I split the barium nitrate 50/50 into 2x 1 litre beakers and added half of the sodium hydroxide to each..
I then cooled both of the beakers in the freezer for an hour or so.

Taken from the freezer I then filtered the precipitate of barium hydroxide through a fine coffee filter (and forgot to save my sodium nitrate for later recovery) and ended up with a nice quantity (around 200g) of barium hydroxide.

Since then I have been taking 20g quantities of barium hydroxide and dissolving in 300m of distilled water then filtering to remove excess hydroxide before adding 55ml of 3% hydrogen peroxide solution which precipitates a slightly off white precipitate.

I expect this is barium peroxide and I will next dry it in an oven.

Admagistr - 5-7-2023 at 15:38

The problem is that when Ba(OH)2 is precipitated out of solution by alkaline hydroxide, it will probably not be well purified, the resulting product will be polluted.Probably better, although technically difficult, would be to decompose BaCO3 at high temperature into BaO and CO2 and then oxidize BaO by annealing in a stream of air.

Alkoholvergiftung - 5-7-2023 at 23:57

Bariumcarbonate has an very high decompusen Temperature and it works only with an hydrogen flame. It seems it reacts back to carbonate with the CO2 from other flamable material.

Admagistr - 6-7-2023 at 09:34

Quote: Originally posted by Alkoholvergiftung  
Bariumcarbonate has an very high decompusen Temperature and it works only with an hydrogen flame. It seems it reacts back to carbonate with the CO2 from other flamable material.

In an electric furnace set at about 1500 C this should not be a problem.Yes, if you use a flame burning hydrocarbons or coke, BaO will be converted back to BaCO3 when the temperature drops.But BaO can preferably be converted to BaO2 by simple annealing in a stream of air!


[Edited on 6-7-2023 by Admagistr]

Chemgineer - 6-7-2023 at 12:42

I have a furnace but it tops out at 1100 C.

I've tested my yellow barium peroxide this evening and it certainly oxidises magnesium powder! No reaction with fine aluminium powder though.

Chemgineer - 14-7-2023 at 13:23

I've been running through this process over the last few days, have produced around 130g of barium peroxide. The process seems inefficient which I think is due to the low solubility of barium hydroxide in water.

I was going to try similar with strontium carbonate, through to strontium nitrate then hydroxide but strontium hydroxide is even less soluble in water than barium hydroxide. What I might do though is add dry strontium hydroxide directly to 3% hydrogen peroxide and allow it to react in excess peroxide. Would just need to leave it stirring for enough time.

[Edited on 14-7-2023 by Chemgineer]

Rainwater - 14-7-2023 at 15:08

Is their a reason why your not using the thermal decomposition pathway?
It seams the simplest tho I have not attempted it yet

Chemgineer - 14-7-2023 at 15:34

Quote: Originally posted by Rainwater  
Is their a reason why your not using the thermal decomposition pathway?
It seams the simplest tho I have not attempted it yet


Because I think I would need 1400 deg C and my furnace tops out at 1100 deg C, I have a gas torch though I could try that.

Admagistr - 15-7-2023 at 15:00

Quote: Originally posted by Chemgineer  
Quote: Originally posted by Rainwater  
Is their a reason why your not using the thermal decomposition pathway?
It seams the simplest tho I have not attempted it yet


Because I think I would need 1400 deg C and my furnace tops out at 1100 deg C, I have a gas torch though I could try that.

Yes, a temperature of just over 1400 C is needed.Laboratory kilns for temperatures up to 1500 C are not very common.But some kilns for firing ceramics reach similar temperatures around 1400 C!

Rainwater - 15-7-2023 at 17:25

Using the nitrate salt, only around 600c would be required producing barium oxide and NOx gas.
At the same temperature, blowing dry, CO2 free air over the oxide should produce the peroxide

[Edited on 16-7-2023 by Rainwater]

Admagistr - 15-7-2023 at 17:38

Quote: Originally posted by Rainwater  
Using the nitrate salt, only around 600c would be required producing barium oxide and NOx gas.
At the same temperature, blowing dry, CO2 free air over the oxide should produce the peroxide

[Edited on 16-7-2023 by Rainwater]


Yeah, nitrate is the obvious choice!It's the easiest way to get a clean product, compared to the wet way...;)

Sulaiman - 16-7-2023 at 00:50

Since I recently bought 500g barium hydroxide
(https://www.sciencemadness.org/whisper/viewthread.php?tid=15...)
I have to ask;
Why start with the carbonate?

The hydroxide was a little more expensive per mole of barium than the carbonate,
but nitric acid is either not cheap, or subject to regulations.

Chemgineer - 16-7-2023 at 07:15

Quote: Originally posted by Sulaiman  
Since I recently bought 500g barium hydroxide
(https://www.sciencemadness.org/whisper/viewthread.php?tid=15...)
I have to ask;
Why start with the carbonate?

The hydroxide was a little more expensive per mole of barium than the carbonate,
but nitric acid is either not cheap, or subject to regulations.


Carbonate was just the easiest to get hold of, believe it is used allot in pyrotechnics.

Rainwater - 17-7-2023 at 02:36

If nitric acid is unavailable, this might be more available.

Solubility will be an issue but thermodynamics says
T = 100c
ΔH  -44.5178  kJ/mol
ΔS  -2.9288  J mol/K
ΔG  -43.4249  kJ/mol 

$$BaCO_{3(s)} + Ca(NO_3)_{2(aq)} \rightarrow Ba(NO_3)_{2(aq)} + CaCO_{3(s)} $$

Should produce a clean product.

Chemgineer - 18-7-2023 at 13:54

Quote: Originally posted by Rainwater  
If nitric acid is unavailable, this might be more available.

Solubility will be an issue but thermodynamics says
T = 100c
ΔH  -44.5178  kJ/mol
ΔS  -2.9288  J mol/K
ΔG  -43.4249  kJ/mol 

$$BaCO_{3(s)} + Ca(NO_3)_{2(aq)} \rightarrow Ba(NO_3)_{2(aq)} + CaCO_{3(s)} $$

Should produce a clean product.


Thanks, i'm alright for nitric acid, my only problem is cleaning sodium sulfate/magnesium sulfate out of 500ml flasks when i've made some more!

Sir_Gawain - 19-7-2023 at 09:51

Sodium and magnesium sulfate are quite soluble in water. I fail to see how that is a problem.

Chemgineer - 19-7-2023 at 10:38

Quote: Originally posted by Sir_Gawain  
Sodium and magnesium sulfate are quite soluble in water. I fail to see how that is a problem.


I didn't mean it was a huge problem, just when you've got a huge solid lump of the mixture in there after a dry distillation it can be tedious to remove it.

Rainwater - 19-7-2023 at 15:19

Been there, I setup a boiling pot, add baking soda and let it simmer for a few hours. It might be soluble, but a large rock is slow to disolive

clearly_not_atara - 19-7-2023 at 20:42

I still don't understand what was wrong with just using acetate. Why faff around trying to make a nitrate? It's more expensive, more dangerous (even if only slightly) and more damaging to dispose of. Acetic acid is cheap, everywhere, and should work fine.

BaCO3 (s) + 2 AcOH >> Ba(OAc)2 (aq) + CO2 (g)

Ba(OAc)2 (s) + H2O2 (NaOAc buffer) >> BaO2 (s) + 2 AcOH

Rainwater - 20-7-2023 at 01:21

I haven't found any references for the acetate reaction.