The "Oxidation of anthracene to anthraquinone" is an easily performed experiment in the classical variant, that provides the desired product in medium yield and with good selectivity. The end product is of very high purity.

The mass efficiency in only in the lower ranges compared to other experiments in the NOP . The energy efficiency of the classical variant of this experiment is better than that of the mechanochemical variant.

(Eco)toxicological data are available for all used substances except for the co-product manganese dioxide, the by-products anthrone and 2-hydroxyantraquinone and ammonium cerium(IV) nitrate. The acute toxicity of educt, product and solvents is relatively low . While anthracene is not carcinogenic and mutagenic only if given in very high doses, the product anthraquinone is mutagenic according to recent results, and probably also carcinogenic and sensitizing. Suspected carcinogens are alos the by-prodcut 2-hydroxyantraquinone and the solvent tetrahydrofuran.

The educt anthracene is biologically not easily degradable and exhibits high toxicity for aquatic organisms. In addition it may be bioaccumulated, thus it has to be considered as dangerous to the environment. The product anthraquinone is somewhat better biologically degradable and has a much lower toxicity to aquatic organisms. . The solvents exhibit only a low toxicity to aquatic organisms and are biologically easily degradable or at least of average degradability.

Summed up we evaluate this experiment with a bad to medium economic efficiency and high toxicological risks as well as a relatively high environmental persistence of the educt with the "yellow light".