[democanarchis]

During a clearout of an old fridge in our lab, two old 100mL bottles of LiAlH₄ 1.0M in Et₂O were discovered. They appear to have dried out, and have a white cake of approx 10-20 cm³ volume now present. They are sealed with sure-seal septa.

I have a found a procedure for disposal of LiAlH₄ in a Hazardous Chemicals Disposal Guide which recommends adding it slowly to a large bucket of butanol and when gas evolution is complete, dilute it with water and allow it to settle. However, I don't know how to safely get it out of the bottle, having read that breaking it up with a spatula in air is enough to cause an explosion. Any suggestions?

[408]

Inject ether, purge with N2, pop off sure seal while N2 still purging, dump contents in butanol.

Is the fancy proper way.




What I would actually do is use them as reactive targets

[azmanam]

Use caution when adding ether to the old bottle.  If your ether is at all wet gas evolution will commence and you will build pressure inside your sure seal bottle.  Stick an argon or nitrogen line AND a big fat needle through the sure seal before you start adding ether so that if gas evolution does occur, the gas has somewhere to escape.

[Doc Oc]

Alternatively, you can draw the LAH out into a syringe and slowly drip it into a large Erlenmeyer with butanol in it (we use isopropanol).  Takes some time, but it works.