Removal of SO2 in Dry Fluidized and Fixed Bed Reactors using Granular Activated Carbon

Abstract

Flue gas desulfurization process has been studied using granular activated carbon in bubbling fluidized bed reactor. For the sake of comparison, fixed bed configuration has been also studied at the same operating conditions. The effect of temperature 30 . T . 80 oC, inlet SO2 concentration 500 . Co . 2000 ppm, and flue gas flow rate 2.5 . Q . 30 ./min were investigated. The results showed that the SO2 removal efficiency increases with increasing reaction temperature up to 80 oC. Also, it was noted that the removal efficiency decreases with increasing the inlet SO2 concentration within the range of temperatures studied. The effect of flue gas flow rate on the desulfurization activity was in two ways; an increase in the removal efficiency with increasing gas flow rate was observed below flow rate = 7.5 ./min, while a decrease in the efficiency was observed upon any increment in the gas flow rate beyond the 7.5 ./min. The results of fluidized bed reactor were used to obtain an empirical correlation and the experimental results were well correlated with the proposed form with a correlation coefficient, (R) =0.989. A reaction rate equation was proposed for the oxidative desulfurization and the activation energy was obtained using differential analysis of integral reactor technique. The resulted value of apparent activation energy was 2.981 kJ/mol.

Keywords

• removal
• activated carbon
• fluidized