Optimizing temperature and introducing new process arrangements for elevating clay's longevity based on the known poisons in the separation process of trace olefins from aromatics

BACKGROUND The clay treatment widely utilized to reduce unsaturated components in aromatic stream has a detrimental effect on catalyst lifetime. Due to the short lifetime of commercial clay, a huge number of studies have been carried out to address this problem over the last decade. This study aims to optimize the temperature for longer serviceability of clay by removal of unsaturated aliphatic components from aromatic streams through the adsorption and catalytic properties of clay. A novel process arrangement is introduced by scheduling the reuse of deactivated clay that is discarded after deactivation. RESULTS Results showed that the suitable range of temperature for olefin removal is 155-205 degrees C, and the optimum temperature with the lowest operational cost was 185 degrees C, which is then gradually elevated to 205 degrees C. CONCLUSION The new process arrangements utilize these results and elevate clay's lifetime by almost 3.5 times, leading to an economical solution on an industrial scale. (c) 2021 Society of Chemical Industry (SCI).