Tactics on Handling Hydrodesulphurised Diesel - The Green Approach

Abstract

This paper deals with the corrosion and environmental problem on handling sulfur content diesel as liquid fuel. Diesel is the one of the most widely consumed motor fuels in India. To meet increasingly strict pollution and environmental legislations, sulfur removal from diesel has attained enormous significance. Sulfur content in diesel must be reduced to 0.035% as per Euro norms. Fuel desulphurization usually yields sulphur as hydrogen sulfide. Sulphur dioxide from non ferrous metal smelting or fuel combustion is most economically recovered as sulfuric acid or liquid sulphur dioxide. In hydrodesulphurization process hydrogen is passed to convert sulfur which is present in diesel in to hydrogen sulphide in the presence of catalyst. In this paper, Hydrodesulphurization on diesel was takes place in fixed bed catalytic reactor with Cobalt- Molybdenum (CoMo) as catalyst on alumina oxide (Al2O3) support. The catalyst was prepared from a solution of ammonium molybdate and cobalt nitrate in water. It is then impregnated with γ-Al2O3 as the catalyst support, then dried and calcinated to convert the molybdate to MoO3. Then the catalyst was taken into sulfide treatment with a mixture of H2S and H2.Sulphur content in diesel was reduced from 0.5 wt% to 0.035 Wt % by increasing the temperature on the reactor up to 3400C. New air pollution regulation are forcing smelters to recover up to 90% of input sulfur and are sharply limiting emissions of sulfur dioxide from fuel combustion. The following parameters were dealed to reduce the sulfur content to 0.035 % (i) Height of packing material (CoMo) (ii) Height of the fixed bed reactor (iii) Volume and Diameter of the reactor. The changes in concentration of sulfur content with respect to the reaction time were measured. The reaction rate constant and space time were found to be 6.67 hr-1 and 0.399 hr. The hydrosedulphurised diesel reduces corrosion problem in Internal Combustion engines and enhances its life time.