Process development and catalyst testing under industrial conditions

Abstract

The development of new processes or modifications of existing industrial processes often leads to acceptance issues, because not all real conditions can be reproduced in non industrial facilities. The investigations under ideal conditions are mostly indispensable for scientific tasks but lead to risks resulting from transferring university results to industry. In this article, a solution to this problem is presented combining the experimental work in university facilities with the needs of industrial plant employers. A tiered approach using preliminary scientific experiments without impurities from lab to miniplant scale followed by a bypass operation with the real industrial plant combines the advantages of the both sides. In line with this approach, intensive theoretical and experimental studies were carried out in the lab of the chair “Process Dynamics and Operation” of the “Technische Universtitat Berlin” for the development of a new emission-free sulfuric acid process. In a further step, a mobile, modular, and fully automated experimental set-up is built and shipped to the industrial partner, where it is operated in bypass to the industrial sulfuric acid plant. Main objectives are to obtain important insights regarding long-term stability and interaction of secondary components. The application of this approach in a real case study shows that a very fast and cost effective process development can be realized with the minimum on risk. In this work, the very successful development of the emission-free sulfuric acid process is presented. Deep information of the reaction mechanism of the sulfur dioxide hydrogenation and side reactions was determined. The results presented in this article allow the development of optimal operational strategies for the whole sulfuric acid plant, which give a completely new perspective to the established process.