(311h) Study on the Hydrogenation Technology of Soybean Oil | AIChE

(311h) Study on the Hydrogenation Technology of Soybean Oil

Authors 

Chong, P. - Presenter, State-Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering,East China University of Science and Technology
Xiangchen, F., State-Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering,East China University of Science and Technology
Ronghui, Z., Fushun research institute of petroleum and petrochemicals, SINOPEC

Soybean oil with low sulfur and nitrogen content, is a clean renewable energy. Studying on soybean oil hydroprocessing for clean fuel production will help mankind reply less on non-renewable energy--oil, which can get significant benefit in environment and society.

This paper studied on the effects of catalysts, reaction temperature, reaction pressure and LHSV on soybean oil HDO(hydrodeoxygenation) with soybean oil as feed in pilot plant. The results showed that different paths of soybean oil happened on different catalysts. Direct HDO reaction mainly occurred on oxidated catalyst, other reactions were side reaction; whereas both direct HDO and decarboxylation happened on sulfided catalyst at the same time. Different reaction conditions had large effect on product performances. The suitable conditions for soybean oil HDS were as followings: 16MPa of reaction pressure, 340~345°C of reaction temperature, 0.6~0.8h-1  of LHSV.

The results of the tests on hydroisodewaxing with soybean oil demonstrated that hydroisodewaxing reaction was mainly occurred in low conversion, while in higher conversion, more paraffin hydrocracking reactions were happened. Jet fuel freezing point was influenced by cutting point and conversion. With the increasing of conversion, freezing point decreased; however, it increased remarkably with the increasing of cutting point. Therefore, when producing 3# jet fuel, only distillates with low FBP and narrow distillation could be cut. Hydroisodewaxing could help decrease diesel solidification point but caused loss on cetane number. However, diesel cetane number was more than 80 after hydroisodewaxing. After hydroisodewaxing, part of jet fuel blending components could be produced, and diesel solidification point was about +10°C, which was the superior diesel blending components. Using soybean oil for HDO, then for hydroisodewaxing, high liquid yields could be attained, 3# jet fuel and diesel with low solification point were produced directly.

In order to broaden the feed sources for hydrotreating, the reaction conditions using gas oil blending with soybean oil were investigated. The results indicated heavy distillates in soybean oil had good conversion performance. During hydroprocessing, oxygen in soybean oil was removed in the form of CO, CO2 and H2O. Though mutual competition between HDO and HDS, the dilution function of soybean oil on feed showed more obviously than the inhibition of HDO on HDS. The diesel products performances after hydrotreated were largely improved, while basically there was no effect on unconverted oil properties.

Topics