Abstract
A model naphtha and benzothiophene-1,1-oxide (BTDO) were used to evaluate five commercial adsorbents in order to select a high-performance adsorbent for the separation of sulfur oxides generated in oxidative desulfurization processes.
In preliminary experimental runs, the adsorbents were examined to determine their ability to reduce the sulfur concentration in the feed from 14 ppm to 1 ppm using 0.2 wt% adsorbent. Three of the five adsorbents, silica gel (SIL), active carbon-impregnated silica gel (ACSIL), and molecular sieve 13X (MS) met this criterion, while active carbon (AC) and silica-alumina type (NBD) adsorbents did not. Screening of the three adsorbents that passed the preliminary test showed that SIL had the highest throughput, which exceeded 1000 g/g-adsorbent, in reducing the sulfur concentration in model naphtha from 1 ppm to 10 ppb. ACSIL and MS could cope with only about 600 g/g-adsorbent.
