Title: carbonization
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - carbonization
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.C00840
Status: current

Definition
A process by which solid residues with increasing content of the element carbon are formed from organic material usually by pyrolysis in an inert atmosphere.

Note
As with all pyrolytic reactions, carbonization is a complex process in which many reactions take place concurrently such as dehydrogenation, condensation, hydrogen transfer and isomerization. It differs from coalification in that its reaction rate is faster by many orders of magnitude. The final pyrolysis temperature applied controls the degree of carbonization and the residual content of foreign elements, e.g. at \(T \sim 1200\ \rm{K}\) the carbon content of the residue exceeds a mass fraction of 90 wt.%, whereas at \(T \sim 1600\ \rm{K}\) more than 99 wt.% carbon is found.

Related Terms
- coalification: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/C01120
- inert: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/I03026
- isomerization: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/I03295
- mass fraction: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/M03722
- pyrolysis: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/P04961

Source
- PAC, 1995, 67, 473. 'Recommended terminology for the description of carbon as a solid (IUPAC Recommendations 1995)' on page 484 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac199567030473)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/C00840/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/C00840/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/C00840/xml

Citation: Citation: 'carbonization' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.C00840
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Accessed: 2026-07-14T09:13:25+00:00