Finishing, catalyst advances

Iron-based ammonia synthesis catalysts of enhanced activity alkali promoter, e.g., sodium, added to the finished catalyst by vapor-phase transport. T.A. Gens (Indianapolis Center for Advanced Research). US 4235749 (1980). 

Resoles. Like the novolak processes, a typical resole process consists of reaction, dehydration, and finishing. Phenol and formaldehyde solution are added all at once to the reactor at a molar ratio of formaldehyde to phenol of 1.2—3.0 1. Catalyst is added and the pH is checked and adjusted if necessary. The catalyst concentration can range from 1—5% for NaOH, 3—6% for Ba(OH)2, and 6—12% for hexa. A reaction temperature of 80—95°C is used with vacuum-reflux control. The high concentration of water and lower enthalpy compared to novolaks allows better exotherm control. In the reaction phase, the temperature is held at 80—90°C and vacuum-refluxing lasts from 1—3 h as determined in the development phase. SoHd resins and certain hquid resins are dehydrated as quickly as possible to prevent overreacting or gelation. The end point is found by manual determination of a specific hot-plate gel time, which decreases as the polymerization advances. Automation includes on-line viscosity measurement, gc, and gpc. 

Advancement Process. In the advancement process, sometimes referred to as the fusion method, Hquid epoxy resin (cmde diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A) is chain-extended with bisphenol A in the presence of a catalyst to yield higher polymerized products. The advancement reaction is conducted at elevated temperatures (175—200°C) and is monitored for epoxy value and viscosity specifications. The finished product is isolated by cooling and cmshing or flaking the molten resin or by allowing it to soHdify in containers. 

The aim with the present paper is to survey the literature on catalytic fuel combustion for high temperature gas turbine applications with emphasis on the progress during the last five years. Reference to work before 1993 can be found in an earlier review from our laboratory. Following a brief introduction to catalytic combustion and a discussion on formation and abatement of emission, state-of-the-art in materials development will be reviewed in Section 3. Recent results from mathematical modelling are covered in Section 4. An update of new concepts of catalytic combustors and advanced pilot-scale tests will be presented in Section 5, where also a case study on a recently finished European project is reported. Finally, deactivation of combustion catalysts is discussed in Section 6 and a spin-off effect of catalytic combustion is recapitulated in Section 7. 

Process NMR is used for chemicals (free/bound moisture, viscosity, activity, loading efficiency in powders, catalysts, liquids, detergents, pigments) and polymers (density, crystallinity, rubber and copolymer content, dispersion of fillers, melt properties, finish content, extent of cure and cross-linking, content of solubles, plasticisers, moisture, etc.). Process NMR is fully operational in the polymer industry, both as on-line units [202] which provide virtually continuous process feedback control as well as off-line and laboratory units for checks of the various processes [198]. The use of NMR for advanced process control has reduced the need for frequent wet tests, has reduced off-spec materials and has improved product transition times. 

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