PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 16043329
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-07
Publication Date: 2019-02
Patent Classification: ["562", "512000"]

Abstract:
Disclosed is a process for recovering formic acid from a formate ester that allows for recovery of a formic acid product comprising greater than 75 wt. % formic acid. Disclosed is also a process for producing formic acid by carbonylating a carrier alcohol, hydrolyzing the formate ester of the carrier alcohol, and recovering a formic acid product comprising greater than 70 wt. % formic acid. Discloses are carrier alcohols that enable more favorable hydrolysis equilibriums and/or distillation sequences.

Claim (Index 17):
A process for producing formic acid, wherein the process comprises,\n a) feeding methanol, an alcohol feed and a catalyst recycle to a dehydrogenative coupling (DHC) zone, wherein the alcohol feed comprises a carrier alcohol and less than 1 wt. % water, performing a DHC reaction of methanol with the carrier alcohol to produce a formate ester of the carrier alcohol, and removing a DHC effluent comprising the formate ester of the carrier alcohol and a homogeneous catalyst; b) feeding the DHC effluent to a catalyst separation zone and removing the catalyst recycle and a formate ester mixture, wherein the catalyst recycle comprises the homogeneous catalyst, and wherein the formate ester mixture comprises the formate ester of the carrier alcohol; c) feeding the formate ester mixture and water to a hydrolysis zone, hydrolyzing the formate ester of the carrier alcohol, and removing a hydrolysis effluent comprising the formate ester of the carrier alcohol, formic acid, and the carrier alcohol; and d) feeding the hydrolysis effluent to a distillation zone and removing a formic acid product and an alcohol/ester stream, wherein the formic acid product comprises greater than 75 wt. % formic acid and the alcohol/ester stream comprises less than 5 wt. % formic acid; wherein the carrier alcohol is selected from the group consisting of C 5  to C 14  secondary and tertiary alcohols, wherein the distillation zone comprises a first distillation column and the hydrolysis effluent is fed to the first distillation column, and wherein (1) each of the formate ester of the carrier alcohol, the carrier alcohol, and any azeotrope formed by the formate ester of the carrier alcohol and the carrier alcohol has a boiling point temperature higher than the formic acid/water azeotrope boiling point temperature, (2) the formate ester of the carrier alcohol and formic acid do not form an azeotrope, and (3) the carrier alcohol and formic acid do not form an azeotrope, with (1)-(3) being satisfied at an operating pressure of the first distillation column.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 42.0
- Percentile: 95.0
- Lexical Diversity: 1.88889
- Patent Class: 562.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['16043324', '10536689', '16332853', '15311939', '13473126']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.6591429595896695
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.62374298967629
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.6556029625983316
- Mean Citation Score: 339.407636
- Max Citation Score: 540.65625
- Similarity Product: 524.3699998296798

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 1
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test