Yes plastic is fine for transit, and to store it some months, but not
several years.
The phosphorus was in some kind of oil, not water, water would ignite it.
ST
On Fri, May 22, 2009 at 10:27 PM, Jack Coats <jack@...> wrote:
> WalMart sells dilute Hydrogen Peroxide (3%) in brown, recyclable HDPE
> bottles. So, if you replace
> it every year or two, I would guess HDPE is a great storage for H2O2.
>
> If I remember right back in high school (think late 1960's, before
> HDPE was popular) we used
> glass bottles for almost everything, and polyethylene bottles for
> basically the same stuff, just
> as transient containers (think students handling this stuff in high
> school - scary thought)
>
> We only had one injury I heard about that is more than minimal. One
> of the lab techs was in the
> store room when the water evaporated down low enough so metallic
> phosphorus was exposed to
> air. He was mainly surprised when it exploded (chemically, not an
> explosion, just a fast burn
> as the phosphorus was exposed to more oxygen in the air) and stuff
> came off the shelves in the
> store room and hit him. ... minimal injury really, but enough to be
> reported. The metal tin the
> phosphorus was stored in was not closed sufficiently (it was like a
> paint can) so eventually a
> good covering of water evaporated exposing the phosphorus.
>
> sorry about the rambling...
>
> In short, HDPE or PE should be good for storage, just don't consider
> it permanent storage.
>
>