Why does fluorination of hydrocarbons with pure F₂ gas occur explosively?

Answer : Fluorination of hydrocarbons with pure fluorine gas occurs explosively. This is due to the following reasons:

1. Due to low bond dissociation energy of F₂ molecule (150.6 kJ mol⁻¹).
2. Due to strong exothermic nature of one of the termination steps.

The energy released in the above step is larger than needed to break a C−C bond (447 kj mol⁻¹ released vs 347.3 kJ mol⁻¹ needed) resulting in fission of the molecule.

However, it is possible to carry out direct fluorination of hydrocarbons by diluting F₂ with an inert gas such as N₂ or Ar.

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