Research on Non-Thermal Plasma assisted HZSM-5 online catalytic upgrading bio-oil

• Published in: Journal of the Energy Institute 2018-08, Vol.91 (4), p.595-604
• Main Authors: Zhao, Weidong, Huang, Jianquan, Ni, Kang, Zhang, Xiaoyin, Lai, Zhihao, Cai, Yixi, Li, Xiaohua
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Bio-oil; Catalytic cracking; HZSM-5; Non-Thermal Plasma; Upgrading
• ISSN: 1743-9671
• DOI: 10.1016/j.joei.2017.03.001

In order to improve the quality of bio-oil and reduce the coking and deactivation of HZSM-5 molecular sieve catalyst in the catalytic cracking of bio-oil upgrading process, Non-Thermal Plasma (NTP) assisted HZSM-5 technical scheme was proposed, online upgrading of rape straw vacuum pyrolytic vapors were conducted in a fixed bed reactor to verify the effectiveness of the technology. In the research, the influence of catalyzing temperature, catalyst bed height, discharge power on the physicochemical properties of refined bio-oil were studied, and the yield of refined bio-oil was regarded as evaluation index, response surface methodology was adopted to optimize upgrading processing parameters. Chemical composition of the refined bio-oil which was obtained under optimized parameters was analyzed by GC–MS, and using thermogravimetric analysis, the impact of NTP on catalyst anti-coking property was evaluated. Research results indicates that catalyzing temperature, catalyst bed height and discharge power have significance effect on yield and physicochemical properties of refined bio-oil. With the optimized processing parameters of 392 °C catalyzing temperature, 34 mm catalyst bed height and 23.7 W discharge power, the oxygen content, high heating value and pH of refined bio-oil were respectively 19.79%, 33.14 MJ/kg and 4.98. Compared with original HZSM-5 catalytic upgrading method, the quality of refined bio-oil was improved obviously, and the amount of catalyst coke deposit reduced from 5.88% to 2.14%, the feasibility of NTP assisted HZSM-5 online upgrading bio-oil was confirmed. •NTP was used as a new technology to dispose bio-oil, which is economical.•Higher bio-oil yield and conversion rate were obtained in this way.•The quality of the refined bio-oil was greatly improved by NTP assisted HZSM-5.•Anti coking performance of the catalyst has been greatly improved.