Park MG  Kang TW

Vol. 8,  No. 1, pp. 11-17, Mar.  2002

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Petcokes is the final product obtained from a refinery process. This petcokes includes high percentage of inorganic and sulfur compounds. Currently, the petcokes produced from domestic refinery plants include more than 6% of sulfur. To use petcokes as valuable raw materials, the weight percentage of sulfur must be lower than 2% of sulfur. Solvent extraction, thermal desulfurization, and hydro-desulfurization have been used to remove the sulfur. In this study, we attempted new approach to remove the sulfur introducing microwave energy. Microwave increase the reaction rates by providing the fast heating and disconnecting the bonding structure of the molecules. The experiments of microwave thermal desulfurization and microwave plus hydrogen gas were carried out to remove the sulfur. We obtained 68.3% of sulfur removal rate with the 2 hours of reaction time and 1835 W of microwave powder. In the experiment of microwave with hydrogen gas, we obtained 86.4% of sulfur removal rate with the 1.5 hours of reaction time and 1835 W of microwave power. If we increase reaction time or decrease the particle size of petcokes, we expect more than 90% of sulfur removal.