A selected ion flow tube study of the reactions of OH- with a number of fully and partially halogenated methanes

In this paper we report the reactions of OH- with the halogenated methanes CCl4, CCl3F, CCl2F2, CClF3, CF4, CHCl3, CHCl2F, CHClF2, CHF3, CH2Cl2, CH2ClF, CH2F2, CH3Cl, and CH3F in a 0.5 Torr helium buffer gas at 300 K using a selected ion flow tube. Reaction rate coefficients were measured and branching ratios determined for the large number of reactions studied. The results are discussed in terms of the thermochemistry of the reactions and barriers that exist to different reaction pathways. It is demonstrated that there is no barrier to proton and Cl+ abstraction, while significant barriers exist for nucleophilic substitution.