Kinetics and mechanism of urethane reactions: Phenyl isocyanate-alcohol systems

Urethane reactions of phenyl isocyanate alcohol systems with toluene as solvent and various aprotic polar solvents (including tertiary amines) as additives were carried out at constant temperature of 10–40°C. Analysis of the variation of the second order rate constants of these systems and those available in the literature indicates that formation of the hydrogen bonding complexes (alcohol with phenyl isocyanate and with aprotic solvent) and electron donor number (DN) of the aprotic solvent are the two factors allowing satisfactory explanation of the catalysis and inhibition effects of the wide range of aprotic solvents (including amines, amides, etc.). Based on these considerations, an ion‐pair mechanism and the resulting kinetic equation for the urethane reaction are proposed. Verification on the kinetic equation with experimental results for the systems of phenyl isocyanate with alcohol in toluene (for the self catalysis of the alcohol), with dimethyl formamide and dimethyl sulfoxide in toluene (for the catalysis of the aprotic solvents), and with triethylamine in toluene (for the catalysis of the tertiary amines) shows satisfactory. In the mechanism, the aprotic solvent is considered to solvate the complex of phenyl isocyanate/alcohol at the active hydrogen to form an ion‐pair which can undergo the urethane reaction more easily.