GB427905A - Process for the production of motor fuel - Google Patents

Abstract

A non-knocking motor fuel boiling between 130 and 240 DEG C., is produced by first dividing a hydrocarbon mixture, consisting largely of aromatic hydrocarbons, into a lower fraction and a fraction at least 80 per cent of which boils between 150 and 240 DEG C., and then subjecting the higher fraction to a refining, catalytic hydrogenation under pressure, in the presence of a catalyst comprising a metal compound and at a temperature below 390 DEG C. As initial materials, benzols or benzines obtained from coal tars may be employed. As catalysts, there may be used compounds, e.g. oxides, hydroxides, sulphides, halides and carbonates, of the metals of the sixth group, especially molybdenum, tungsten, chromium and uranium, and of strontium, vanadium manganese, rhenium, titanium, zirconium, zinc, cadmium, aluminium and cobalt. The catalyst may be deposited on carriers, preferably in the colloidal condition. The pressures employed may vary between 20 and 1000 atmospheres and the temperatures may lie between 200 and 390 DEG C, preferably 300 or 340--390 DEG C. Hydrogen alone or mixed with other gases e.g. nitrogen, carbon monoxide or dioxide, hydrogen sulphide, water vapour or methane, and the quantity may vary from 300 to 2000 cubic metres per ton of hydrocarbon treated which may be in the vapour phase. In a preferred method, a hydrocarbon mixture consisting mainly of aromatic hydrocarbons, e.g. crude or heavy benzol, is divided into two fractions, one boiling below 130 DEG C. and the other above, the second fraction being subjected to a refining hydrogenation and the first fraction to a chemical refining, e.g. with sulphuric acid. The products may be blended with other motor fuels, e.g. benzine. In an example, crude benzol is divided by distillation into a lower fraction boiling up to 160 DEG C., and a higher fraction boiling between 160--220 DEG C. The higher fraction is passed with hydrogen under a pressure of 200 atmospheres and at a temperature of 370 DEG C., over a catalyst comprising molybdic acid, zinc oxide and magnesia the conditions being such that no substantial splitting or hydrogenation of the aromatic nuclei takes place. A purified heavy benzol of boiling range 150--225 DEG C., is obtained. Specifications 349,655 and 372,783 are referred to.