Biological desulfurization (BDS) of middle distillates

Miscellaneous · Fri Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 1993

OSTI ID:7275956

Monticello, D J ^[1]

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1. Energy BioSystems Corp., The Woodlands, TX (United States)

As implementation of the Clean Air Act Amendment draws near, sulfur management will play a key role for the refining industry. Industry experts have estimated that the petroleum industry will spend billions of dollars to conform to the Clean Air Act and desulfurization capacity will account for a significant portion of those expenditures. The need to limit the sulfur content of finished products is not new, but this dramatic increase in expenditures is the result of the increasingly stringent environmental regulations in the US, Europe and the Far East. These regulations will be implemented over the next ten years and will have serious implications for the refining industry. The purpose of this paper is to describe an alternative approach to desulfurization based on the recent advances in biotechnology and to outline the progress which has been made in recent years in this area. Biocatalytic Desulfurization (BDS) is not a commercial technology, but conceptual engineering and sensitivity analyses have shown that the approach has great promise. Several Government, University and Industrial groups are working now to develop the technology. The recent advances which have resulted from the application of the new tools of biotechnology to the problem have accelerated the development effort, and the first commercial BDS units may be available in 1996.

• OSTI ID: 7275956
• Resource Relation: Other Information: Paper AM-93-14
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

02 PETROLEUM
PETROLEUM DISTILLATES
BIODEGRADATION
DESULFURIZATION
FLOWSHEETS
PERFORMANCE TESTING
PETROLEUM
PETROLEUM REFINERIES
SULFUR CONTENT
CHEMICAL REACTIONS
DECOMPOSITION
DIAGRAMS
DISTILLATES
ENERGY SOURCES
FOSSIL FUELS
FUELS
INDUSTRIAL PLANTS
PETROLEUM FRACTIONS
TESTING
020400* - Petroleum- Processing