High-temperature decomposition of N2O from the HNO3 production: Process feasibility using a structured catalyst

Abstract

The high-temperature decomposition of N2O in a structured catalyst was studied using a full three-dimensional (3D) model in the temperature range 700–900 °C and high pressure (0.4–0.8 MPa), under realistic gas phase composition, i.e. with 1000 ppm of N2O, high concentrations of NO (9.5–10.5 mol%), O2 (4.5–5.0 mol%), and H2O (15.5–16.8 mol%). The kinetic data gathered from the previous study of the FeOx/Al2O3 catalyst displaying only medium activity were used as the input data. A single-channel 3D model without additional simplifications of fluid flow patterns and mass transfer in fluid and solid catalyst phases was employed to investigate the potential performance of a monolith reactor for N2O decomposition at high temperature regime. The model clearly predicted a relevant performance of the optimized honeycomb system based on such FeOx/Al2O3 catalyst.