Sub-Product

Chloroform is an organic compound with formula CHCl₃. It is a colorless, sweet-smelling, dense liquid that is produced on a large scale as a precursor to PTFE and refrigerants, but the latter application is declining. It is one of the four chloromethanes and a trihalomethane.

In industry, chloroform is produced by heating a mixture of chlorine and either chloromethane or methane. At 400–500 °C, a free radical halogenation occurs, converting these precursors to progressively more chlorinated compounds:

Chloroform undergoes further chlorination to yield carbon tetrachloride (CCl₄):

The output of this process is a mixture of the four chloromethanes (chloromethane, dichloromethane, chloroform, and carbon tetrachloride), which can then be separated by distillation.

Source: Infogalactic, Chlorofom.