How do you account for the following observations?
(a) Though alkaline potassium permanganate and acidic potassium permanganate both are used as oxidants, yet in the manufacture of benzoic acid from toluene we use alcoholic potassium permanganate as an oxidant. Why? Write a balanced redox equation for the reaction.
Solution:- Toluene can be oxidized to benzoic acid in acidic, basic, neutral media according to following redox equations.
In the laboratory, benzoic acid is usually prepared by alkaline KMnO
4 oxidation of toluene. However, in industry alcoholic KMnO
4 is preferred over acidic or alkaline KMnO
4 because of the following reasons:
(i) The cost of adding an acid or the base is avoided because in the neutral medium, the base (OH
- ions) are produced in the reaction itself.
(ii) Since reactions occur faster in homogeneous medium than in heterogeneous medium, therefore, alcohol helps in mixing the two reactants, i.e., KMnO
4(due to its polar nature) and toluene (because of its being an organic compound).
My doubts or query: In the attached image, 1)how the equation 3 is derived from 1 +2 ?
2) Is equation 1b correctly stated? If not, what is the correct equation? If yes, How?Please explain.
3)How the equation 1c is derived from the addition of 1a and 1b?