A SOLVENT DRIES UP

A SHORTAGE of acetonitrile is leaving chemists around the U.S. and beyond wondering how long their supplies will last and what their options will be if stocks run dry. There are good reasons why the situation is making chemists feel vulnerable. Thousands of them use the polar solvent in high-performance liquid chromatography. It is also used in pharmaceutical synthesis and in the extraction of butadiene from streams of C 4 hydrocarbons. Laboratory chemical suppliers have been allocating acetonitrile to existing customers or not selling it at all. “The market is beyond short,” says Jerry Richard of Purification Technologies, a Chester, Conn.-based firm that buys acetonitrile in bulk, purifies it, and sells it to laboratory chemical suppliers. “You have people scrambling around trying to get material. My phone is ringing off the hook.” Richard says the heart of the problem is that acetonitrile goes into applications that are healthy and growing. But its production is tied to ...