Abstract
Catalytic decomposition of pyridine (C_5H_5N) with an Australian α-FeOOH-rich limonite ore has been studied with a vertical, cylindrical quartz reactor to develop a novel hot gas cleanup method of removing the nitrogen present in tar as N_2. The limonite achieves the almost complete decomposition of 100 ppmv C_5H_5N in inert gas at 500℃ under a large space velocity of 51000 h^<-1> and maintains the high activity at least for 10h. The limonite can also give high N_2 yield of more than 85%, and the yield is almost constant for 10h reaction. The XRD analyses reveal that α-FeOOH in the limonite is transformed into metallic iron (α-Fe) with the average crystalline size of 25 nm upon H_2 reduction at 500℃. It is thus probable that the finely dispersed α-Fe can catalyze N_2 formnation from pyridine.
