Experimental and kinetic study of the nitration of 2-ethylhexanol in capillary microreactors

•The nitration of 2-ethylhexanol was investigated in capillary microreactors.•Both the apparent and intrinsic reaction kinetics were studied.•The activity of solutes was taken full into account in the kinetic model.•The kinetic is found to be first order to nitric acid and 2-ethylhexanol, respectively.•The activation energy of the reaction is 42.67kJ/mol.