Trace amounts of metal contaminants are sequestered within an organic solvent process stream by a process comprising the steps of (i) adding to the organic solvent process stream a chelating amount of a chelating agent, and (ii) contacting the chelating agent in the organic solvent process stream with the metal contaminant to form a chelated metal contaminant. In one embodiment, the organic solvent process stream is a glycol ether process stream, the chelating agent is triethylenetetraamine, and the metal contaminant is copper. The chelated or sequestered metal contaminant is removed from the glycol ether process stream by distillation, and the final glycol ether product contains a low level of unwanted by-products, e.g., aldehydes.
展开▼
