Study of the Adsorption of Nitrogen Compounds for Diesel Fuel Production Using Three Commercial Materials

The aim of this work was to study the removal of nitrogen (N-) compounds for ultra-low sulfur diesel (ULSD) production purposes by using three commercial materials: selexsorb® CDX (CDX), silica gel (SG), and activated carbon VG-077 (VG-077). The experiments were conducted in three steps: (1) Adsorption of quinoline, indole, or carbazole from model fuels (300wppm in a 1:1g/g nhexadecane:toluene mixture) in a batch setup; adsorption of N- compounds from straight run gas oil (SRGO): (2) in a batch setup, and (3) in a fixed-bed column (FBC). Langmuir and Freundlich models were considered for modeling the adsorption isotherms of quinoline, indole, carbazole from model fuels and N-compounds from SRGO. Clark and Thomas models were employed for fitting the FBC