Pyrolysis Pathways of Sulfonated Polyethylene, an Alternative Carbon Fiber Precursor

Polyethylene is an emerging precursor material for the production of carbon fibers. Its sulfonated derivative yields ordered carbon when pyrolyzed under inert atmosphere. Here, we investigate its pyrolysis pathways by selecting <i>n</i>-heptane-4-sulfonic acid (H4S) as a model compound. Density functional theory and transition state theory were used to determine the rate constants of pyrolysis for H4S from 300 to 1000 K. Multiple reaction channels from two different mechanisms were explored: (1) internal five-centered elimination (E_<i>i</i>5) and (2) radical chain reaction. The pyrolysis of H4S was simulated with kinetic Monte Carlo (kMC) to obtain thermogravimetric (TGA) plots that compared favorably to experiment. We observed that at temperatures <550 K, the radical mechanism was dominant and yielded the <i>trans</i>-alkene, whereas <i>cis</i>-alkene was formed at higher temperatures from the internal elimination. The maximum rates of % mass loss became independent of initial ȮH radical concentration at 440–480 K. Experimentally, the maximum % mass loss occurred from 440 to 460 K (heating rate dependent). Activation energies derived from the kMC-simulated TGAs of H4S (26–29 kcal/mol) agreed with experiment for sulfonated polyethylene (∼31 kcal/mol). The simulations revealed that in this region, decomposition of radical HOSȮ₂ became competitive to α-H abstraction by HOSȮ₂, making ȮH the carrying radical for the reaction chain. The maximum rate of % mass loss for internal elimination was observed at temperatures >600 K. Low-scale carbonization utilizes temperatures <620 K; thus, internal elimination will not be competitive. E_<i>i</i>5 elimination has been studied for sulfoxides and sulfones, but this represents the first study of internal elimination in sulfonic acids