5603748 Process and apparatus for a direct reduction of iron oxide containing materials to form Fe3C: Hirsch Martin; Husain Reza; Saatci Alpaydin; Bresser Wolfgang Friedrichsdorf, Germany assigned to Lurgi Metallurgie GmbH

Abstract

The testing of hydrotreating catalysts in pilot scale reactors is often complicated by variations in catalyst condition, reactor dynamics and intra- and interphase oil transport phenomena. This paper describes the influence of catalyst moisture content, catalyst particle size distribution, catalyst bulk density, presulfiding, catalyst shape and loading effects on the hydrodesulfurization (HDS) and hydrodenitrogenation (HDN) activities of several commercial catalysts. The HDS and HDN activities generally decrease with increasing moisture content of the catalyst (between 1 and 6% loss on ignition). Long particles in pilot scale units often distort results due to hold-up/ channeling effects. Presulfiding at low temperatures is seen to lower overall conversion but does not change catalyst rankings appreciably. Variations in loading patterns have less effect on final conversion than does the use of small particle size inert diluent. Glass wool interbed plugs are shown to improve test reproducibility due, presumably, to improved oil dispersion and catalyst utilization. Upflow processing results in slightly higher conversions over downflow processing during the first five days of testing. However catalyst rankings are seen to be unchanged.