6 while varying the acid content of the reaction mixture (FIG. L'auteur décrit un appareil pour la préparation continue de phénol à partir de cumène et un schéma simplifié d'opération pour la production à plus grande échelle. gloves, face shield, boots, vapor respirator and full suit should be worn. An improved process for the production of phenol or a derivative thereof by the acid-catalyzed cleavage of a feedstock comprising a reactant cumene hydroperoxide and a contaminant by-product dimethylbenzyl alcohol to convert the hydroperoxide to phenol (or said derivative thereof) and α-methyl styrene, wherein the improvement comprises conducting the cleavage reaction in at least one stirred reactor during a residence time of not more than about five minutes effective to promote reaction of the dimethylbenzyl alcohol to α-methyl styrene wherein a product effluent is fed from said stirred reactor to a plug-flow reactor for additional conversion of the dimethylbenzyl alcohol to α-methyl styrene. It is designed for an annual output of 35 million pounds of phenol, and some 20 million pounds of acetone, which also will be marketed through Oronite. Acetone and phenol can be used to produce bisphenol-A, which is condensed with phosgene to produce polycarbonate plastics. 17. In a single CSTR-PFR system, the main reaction of CHP to yield phenol and acetone occurs in the CSTR, as is preferrable because of the ample ability to remove the heat of reaction by refluxing acetone. 4,358,618 teaches a variation on the cumene process whereby the formation of DCP as an intermediate is promoted in a first reaction step, and then the DCP is decomposed in a second reaction step to yield phenol, acetone, and AMS. [4] L. Pellegrini, S. Bonomi, and G. Biardi, "DYNAMIC SIMULATION OF THE CLEAVAGE SECTION IN A PHENOL PLANT FOR SAFETY ANALYSIS," Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering Politecnico of Milan, Milan, 2001. Oxidation of hydroquinone gives 1,4-benzoquinone: Clicking on the donut icon will load a page at altmetric.com with additional details about the score and the social media presence for the given article. Although a single CSTR provides good AMS yields initially, it can be seen that the combined system provides an improved AMS yield after about a 21/2-minute residence time in the PFR, and the production of heavies is at all times lower than in the CSTR. cumene and oxygen. 2OOH → C U.S. Pat. 4,016,213 varies the typical cumene process by immediately neutralizing the reaction product to prevent the dehydration of DMBA to AMS. 3) In these runs, the single parameters of acid concentration and acetone addition were varied. for the conditions of the fourth run at 80° C. All of these results tend to show that the maximum AMS yield occurs rather rapidly, generaly within five minutes of reaction. Hence, there was the need to make meaningful assumptions. Different amounts of DCP or DMBA were added to the reactor containing known amounts of the various components in the synthetic reaction mixture for six experimental runs. The reaction mixture also contains significant amounts of the contaminant by-products and the various cleavage reaction by-products. The process as defined by claim 5, wherein the residence time in the stirred reactor is not more than about one minute. 8). The neural network model with back propagation algorithm is used and the results are compared with those of multiple regression analysis. Data from experiments shown below were used to determine the dependence of the rate constants on the variables of temperature and the concentrations of acid, water, and phenol. A further reduction in residence times leaves even more unconverted DMBA which exits in the heavies stream but which would increase the steady state concentration. Because a series of n CSTRs in series approaches PFR kinetics as n increases, another preferred embodiment is a series of CSTR reactors having a reduced total residence time.