Selective Removal of Nitrogen-Containing Heterocyclic Compounds from Transportation Diesel Fuels with Reactive Adsorbent

This paper presents a new selective adsorbent to remove nitrogen-containing heterocyclic compounds from model and commercial transportation diesel fuels based on characteristic reaction designed to occur in the pores of substrate. This reactive adsorbent is composed of formaldehyde, phosphotungstic acid and Santa Barbara USA (SBA)-15. The experiment was based on assumed hydroxymethylation reaction of nitrogen-containing heterocyclic compounds with formaldehyde using phosphotungstic acid as catalyst in batch and fixed-bed systems. The nitrogen concentration in the model fuel was 237.33 ng·μl−1, carbazole and toluene were used as model nitrogen-containing heterocyclic compound and solvent, respectively. The effectiveness of reactive adsorbent for removal of nitrogen-containing heterocyclic compounds from commercial 0# diesel fuel containing 224.86 ng·μl−1 nitrogen was examined in a fixed-bed reactor at 70 °C. The results showed that nitrogen in the model fuel was very low and the nitrogen concentration in the commercial diesel reduced to 2.44 ng·μl−1. The demand for transportation fuel with ultra-low nitrogen is satisfied.