(ii) By reduction of carboxylic acids and esters: Carboxylic acids
are reduced to primary alcohols in excellent yields by lithium
aluminium hydride, a strong reducing agent RCOOH
(i) LiAlH4
(ii) H O
2
RCH OH
2
However, LiAlH4 is an expensive reagent, and therefore,  used
for preparing special chemicals only Commercially, acids are
reduced to alcohols by converting them to the esters (Section
7 4