Two X-ray techniques give a 3-D view of why catalysts used in gasoline production go badMerging two
Two X-ray techniques give a 3-D view of why catalysts used in gasoline production go bad
Merging two powerful 3-D X-ray techniques, a team of researchers from the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Utrecht University in the Netherlands revealed new details of a process known as metal poisoning that clogs the pores of catalyst particles used in gasoline production, causing them to lose effectiveness.
The team combined their data to produce a video that shows the chemistry of this aging process and takes the viewer on a virtual flight through the pores of a catalyst particle. The results were published today in Nature Communications.
The particles, known as fluid catalytic cracking or FCC particles, are used in oil refineries to “crack” large molecules that are left after distillation of crude oil into smaller molecules, such as gasoline. Those oil molecules flow through the catalyst particles in tiny pores and passageways, which ensure accessibility to the active domains where chemical reactions can take place. But while the catalyst material is not consumed in the reaction and in theory could be recycled indefinitely, the pores clog up and the particles slowly lose effectiveness. Worldwide, about 400 reactor systems refine oil into gasoline, accounting for about 40 to 50 percent of today’s gasoline production, and each system requires 10 to 40 tons of fresh FCC catalysts daily.
