Research fluid catalytic cracking

Catalytic Pyrolysis. This should not be confused with fluid catalytic cracking, which is used in petroleum refining (see Catalysts, regeneration). Catalytic pyrolysis is aimed at producing primarily ethylene. There are many patents and research articles covering the last 20 years (84—89). Catalytic research until 1988 has been summarized (86). Almost all catalysts produce higher amounts of CO and CO2 than normally obtained with conventional pyrolysis. This indicates that the water gas reaction is also very active with these catalysts, and usually this leads to some deterioration of the olefin yield. Significant amounts of coke have been found in these catalysts, and thus there is a further reduction in olefin yield with on-stream time. Most of these catalysts are based on low surface area alumina catalysts (86). A notable exception is the catalyst developed in the former USSR (89). This catalyst primarily contains vanadium as the active material on pumice (89), and is claimed to produce low levels of carbon oxides. 

In response to recent federal and local environmental concerns (e.g., industrial emission controls and lead phase-out) and to the growing interest of refiners in cracking residual fuels, researchers have generated new families of cracking catalysts. There is now a need to review the merits of these newly developed materials. This volume contains contributions from researchers involved in the preparation and characterization of cracking catalysts. Other important aspects of fluid catalytic cracking, such as feedstocks and process hardware effects in refining, have been intentionally omitted because of time limitations and should be treated separately in future volumes. 

Harding, R. H., Zhao, X., Qian, K., Rajagopalan, K., and Cheng, W.-C. Fluid Catalytic Cracking Selectivities of Gas Oil Boiling Point and Hydrocarbon Fractions. Industrial Engineering Chemistry Research 35 (1996) 2561-69. 

Octane barrel yield a measure used to evaluate fluid catalytic cracking processes defined as (RON + MON)/2 times the gasoline yield, where RON is the research octane number and MON is the motor octane number. 

Y. Huang, G.V. Reklaitis, and V. Venkatasubramanian. A heuristic extended Kalman filter based estimator for fault identification in a fluid catalytic cracking unit. Industrial Engineering Chemistry Research, 42 3361-3371, 2003. 

While these techniques have been applied to energy-related processes such as heat-integrated distillation columns and fluid catalytic cracking reactors, there is still extensive research required before the concept of plant design/control is reduced to practice. 

Luckenbach, E. C. (1978) U.S. 4,081,508, to Exxon Research and Engineering Co. Process for reducing flue gas contaminants from fluid catalytic cracking regenerator. 

A. Stanislaus and H. Qabazard, Advances in fluid catalytic cracking A review. Technical Report, Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research, Kuwait, KISR 4356, (1994). 

RFCC (resid fluid catalytic cracking) is one of the processes for the conversion of heavy oils in modem refineries. The problem with vacuum residue as FCC feedstock is quick deactivation of catalysts by the coking of asphaltene fractions and the deposition of metals involved in metallorganic polycyclic compounds. Therefore, developing novel zeolites to achieve metal tolerance has long been a goal of catalyst researchers... 

Jersey Standard had many officials, from the president down, serving on various committees devoted to preparation for war in advance of the U.S. entry into WWII. In the case of fluid catalytic cracking, Jersey Standard was driven not by perceived war demand but by the need to find a way to produce gasoline for autos that could compete with the fuel produced by Houdry catalytic cracking units. However, without the wartime conditions, it is likely that Jersey Standard would have taken longer than three years to go from research to an operating commercial unit. The first commercial fluid units were tremendously expensive because of their overpowering size and complexity (55). 

During 1935 to 1945 inclusive, the fluid catalytic cracking research totaled about 34 million and was borne entirely by Jersey Standard (54). In contrast,... 

Auto/Oil Air Quality Improvement Research Program. Technical Bulletins No.l to No.5 prepared by/for Marathon, Mobil, Chevron, Ford, Conoco, GM, Amoco, Unio, Chrysler, Shell, BP, Phillips, Arco, Exxon, Ashland, Texaco and Sunoco. December (1990) to June (1991). Avidan, A.A., M. Edwards and H. Owen, Fluid Catalytic Cracking - Past And Future... 

Prior to 1938, gasoline was obtained from thermal-cracking plants then the Houdry fixed-bed catalytic cracking process led to the development of a fluidized-bed process by Standard Oil for the catalytic production of motor fuels (4-8). Acid-treated clays of the montmorilIonite type were the first fluid-cracking catalysts widely employed by the industry. However, the ever greater demand for aviation fuels during the 1939-1945 period prompted the search for more active and selective catalysts. Research on novel catalyst... 

Anyone who is seriously involved in catalytic cracking, whether as an operator, a catalyst manufacturer, or a researcher, soon learns how severely sodium, vanadium, nickel, iron, and copper act as poisons. In the past, FCC feedstock preparation via vacuum distillation was to a considerable extent, determined by metal carryover. Generally, metal carryover to the fluid unit was limited to 0.1 ppm or less of each of these metals. 

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