Adsorptive desulfurization of transportation fuels over Ni-based adsorbents derived from layered double hydroxides

Desulfurization of transportation fuels is an important topic due to the new EPA tier II regulations to cut the sulfur in diesel fuel from 500 to 15 ppm wt by 2006. Nickel based layered double hydroxide adsorbents were created and their potential use for desulfurization of model fuels was tested. Two nickel based adsorbents of different atomic weight ratios, 4:3.1 Ni/Zn/Al and 5.5:5.5:1 Ni/Zn/Al, were synthesized by co-precipitation. The adsorbents were then calcined, reduced, and tested in a packed bed reactor with both model diesel and model jet fuel. The treated fuel was tested using a total sulfur analyzer and the adsorbent was proven to selectively adsorb sulfur. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the 228th ACS National Meeting (Philadelphia, PA 8/22-26/2004).