Question

The reduction of phenol to benzene is carried out with sodium borohydride.
A.True
B.False

Answer 1

Phenol is an organic compound that is made up of a phenyl group attached to an alcohol group. It has a sweet and tarry odor. It is used in the production of various chemicals. It shows acidic nature as its conjugate base is very stable due to resonance.

Complete step by step answer:
Phenols are cyclic organic compounds that are formed when one or more sites on a benzene ring, substitute their hydrogen atoms in exchange for the corresponding number of $- OH$ or alcoholic functional group.
Sodium borohydride is a weak reducing agent; it cannot reduce the electron-rich phenol to prepare benzene. But phenol can be converted into benzene by reaction with Zinc dust. the reaction is shown below,
${C_6}{H_5}OH\,\,\xrightarrow{{Zn\,\,Dust/\Delta }}{C_6}{H_6}$
So, the given statement is false.

The correct option is B.

Additional information:
Now, phenols are formed as a product in various reactions, but it is not possible to completely extract all of the phenol formed from these reactions.
Hence, certain methods are developed just to maximize the extraction of phenol from a given chemical reaction. One such process is known as the Cumene process.
Cumene process for manufacturing phenol has many names including cumene – phenol process and Hock process. This method is used for producing both phenol and acetone. The reactants used in this reaction are benzene and propylene. Another important reactant required is oxygen, which is obtained from the air. Also, to be included is a small amount of radical initiators. This method is used all over the world for the production of phenol. The chemical reaction involved in this process is as follows:

Note: The cumene process is a widely used method for the production of phenol. It involves synthesizing two relatively cheap compounds, viz. Benzene and propylene, into two extremely useful products like phenol and acetone. The most important chemical made from phenol is bisphenol A, which is used to make the polycarbonates. Phenol is also catalytically reduced to cyclohexanol which is used in the manufacture of polyamides 6 and 6, 6.