TITLE: Liquid Phase Methanol Process Development Unit: Installation, Operation, and Support Studies. Technical Progress Report No. 9, 1 October-31 December 1983.

INST.  AUTHOR: Air Products and Chemicals, Inc., Allentown, PA.

SPONSOR: Chem Systems, Inc., Tarrytown, NY.*Department of Energy, Washington, DC.

LANGUAGE: English

PUB.  TYPE: Technical Report

PUB.  COUNTRY: United States

SOURCE: Department of Energy [DE],  20 Jan 84,  98p.

ABSTRACT:

At Chem Systems, the Fairfield Lab PDU completed a 510-hour run in the ebullated mode with catalyst candidate EPJ-25L, the alternate catalyst candidate for LaPorte. Balanced gas feed was run for the first 60 hours and CO-rich gas for the remainder of the test. Pressure and temperature were fixed at 765 psia and 482 exp 0 F. Gas velocity was fixed at 0.10 ft/sec over the first 250 hours and then varied, including a period at 0.17 ft/sec, the LaPorte gas velocity. Catalyst attrition and methanol productivity were similar to candidate EPJ-19LR, however, bed density variations developed after 150 hours and worsened through the run.  EPJ-19LR has been selected as the LaPorte catalyst. The Lab PDU also operated in the slurry mode for the second time, a 265-hour run using a nominal 17 wt% of catalyst F50/4E75-01. The slurry loading was increased to about 27 wt % (about 18 wt % in run No. 1). Balanced and CO-rich gas were run at 515 to 1015 psia, 437 to 482 exp 0 F, and 0.04 to 0.21 ft/sec superficial gas velocity. Unlike the first run, catalyst plugging and coating problems were encountered and methanol productivity was lower than expected. In the laboratory bench-scale effort at Fairfield, two of the APCI developmental catalyst powders were screened in the 2-liter autoclave. The Cu/Zn/Al sub 2 O sub 3 preparation was less active than the commercial reference powders but the Cu/Zn/Boron preparation exhibited comparable productivity. In the Allentown laboratories, two 1400-hour gas-phase activity maintenance runs were accomplished with CO-rich gas at 765 psia and 437 to 482 exp 0 F. (ERA citation 09:013445)

REPORT  NUMBER: DOE/PC/30019-T10

CONTRACT  NUMBER: AC22-81PC30019