Patent ID: 8541627

Claim:
A process for hydroformylating an olefin feed in the presence of a homogeneous catalyst to form an organic hydroformylation reaction product, the catalyst comprising a carbonyl compound of a first metal which is cobalt, which process comprises: (a) performing a first demetalling step ( 101 ) comprising contacting the organic cobalt catalyst-containing reaction product ( 11 ) with an aqueous solution ( 1 ) of a salt of a second metal and a first acid, the first acid having a pKa of at least 1.5 at 25° C., to form an aqueous solution ( 2 ) comprising a salt of the second metal having cobalt carbonyl as anion, (b) performing a first separation step ( 102 ) on the product of step (a) which comprises separating the aqueous solution ( 2 ) from the organic hydroformylation reaction product to form an organic reaction product having reduced cobalt content ( 13 ), (c) performing a second demetalling step ( 103 ) comprising contacting the organic reaction product ( 13 ) separated in step (b), in the presence of an oxygen-containing gas or an oxygen-donating compound ( 7 ), with an aqueous solution ( 3 ) of a second acid to form (i) an aqueous solution ( 4 ) comprising a cobalt salt of the second acid and (ii) a cobalt-depleted organic reaction product ( 15 ), and (d) recycling at least part of the aqueous solution ( 2 ) separated in step (b) to the hydroformylation reaction ( 200 ).