Direct fluorination of polymeric materials by using dioxifluorine fluid (mixture of CO2 and F2)

Claim 1

In a gas-phase process for treating solid polymeric materials with elemental fluorine to cause a chemical reaction between the fluorine and polymeric material, wherein the polymeric material is placed in a sealed reaction chamber, and wherein fluorine is supplied to the reaction chamber, and wherein a carrier fluid is supplied to the reaction chamber, either separately or as recombined mixture with fluorine, and wherein a reaction is allowed to take place in the reaction chamber to fluorinate said polymeric materials with said mixture of fluorine and carrier fluid, the improvement comprising the step of supplying gaseous carbon dioxide to said reaction chamber as said carrier fluid so that a gaseous mixture of carbon dioxide and fluorine treats the polymeric materials, with the percentage of fluorine to carbon dioxide by volume in the reaction chamber being in the range of from 2% to 20% for the reaction.