Sulfuric acid integrated processing

Extractive distillation processes are still widely used for nitric acid concentration. Because the operational and maintenance problems associated with sulfuric acid concentration plants are considerable, and their capital cost substantial, attention has been directed periodically to the use of extractive agents other than sulfuric acid. Phosphoric acid (I) acts like sulfuric acid but poses similar problems of reconcentration. Solutions of certain metallic salts, in particular metallic nitrates, permit similar enhancement of relative volatility and are readily reconcentrated in straightforward evaporation equipment, offering the possibility of a compact integrated concentration process. 

Nitrobenzene (Aniline). The U.S. nitrobenzene production was about 2 billion lb in 1999. Two types of manufacturing processes were used the direct nitration and the adiabatic nitration process. In the direct nitration system, benzene is mixed with a mixture of nitric/ sulfuric acid. The reaction can be carried out in either a batch or a continuous system. Those reactors require a cooling system to keep it at constant temperature. It also requires a separate system for sulfuric acid reconcentration. In the adiabatic process, water is flashed off under vacuum before the sulfuric acid/nitrobenzene separation. The advantage of the adiabatic process is to eliminate a separated sulfuric acid reconcentration unit. This also will provide a better heat integration. Recently, the disposal of nitrophenols has become a major issue for aniline manufacture. Small amounts of nitrophenols are always made during the benzene... 

Considerable reduction in acid requirements and alkylation production cost are obtained by ester concentration, as shown by Figure 2. The operation of the earlier plant demonstrated the process operability of the system, but disclosed mechanical and operational limitations of equipment available that made the process uneconomical at that time. Today energy costs have changed and sulfuric acid is no longer worth 20/ton. This process, installed in an alkylation unit with the equipment available today, can be an Integral part of the alkylation system to substantially reduce alkylate production costs. 

Supplemental processes which can be operated in conjunction with alkylation and/or sulfuric acid production can influence the overall economics. Examples are (1) the integration of normal butane-to-isobutane isomerization with alkylation, utilizing common fractionation equipment and (2), utilizing 65% sulfuric acid extraction of isobutylene or isoamylene from olefins fed to alkylation, justified by monetary return on sale of the high purity iso-olefin as a petrochemical feedstock, which reduces quantity of alkylate produced and reduces isobutane required while producing still higher quality alkylate with sulfuric acid catalyst. 

The sulfuric acid and the HI decomposition reactions in Sections II and III are both catalytic processes. A variety of oxides, activated charcoal, and platinum have been employed as the catalyst for these reactions. Ongoing research in this area is trying to identify the optimal catalyst support to minimize the overall cost and integration of the catalyst into the process systems. 

The Hybrid Sulfur (HyS) thermochemical cycle task addresses the key technology issues involved in the development of a hybrid sulfur hydrogen production system - including the SO2 - H2O electrolyzer design, SO2/O2 separation, and the unique materials and process issues associated with the acid decomposition section. An electrolyser is being developed that can be used in conjunction with the sulfuric acid decomposition section being developed for the S-I cycle in a Hybrid Sulfur Integrated Laboratory-Scale Experiment. 

In the quadrature method of moments (QMOM) developed by McGraw [131], for the description of sulfuric acid-water aerosol dynamics (growth), a certain type of quadrature function approximations are introduced to approximate the evolution of the integrals determining the moments. Marchisio et al [122, 123] extended the QMOM for the application to aggregation-breakage processes. For the solution of crystallization and precipitation kernels the size distribution function is expressed using an expansion in delta functions [122, 123] ... 

As// is easily measured in an isothermal calorimeter by monitoring the heat evolved or absorbed on successive additions of solvent to a given amount of. solute. The table below gives the integral heat-of-solution data for 1 mol of sulfuric acid in water at 25 C (the negative sign indicates that heat is evolved in the dilution process). 

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