Yakubu J., Patel R., Mujtaba I., 2017, Optimization of Fluidized Catalytic Cracking Unit Regenerator to Minimize CO2 Emissions, Chemical Engineering Transactions, 57, 1531-1536.
The Fluidized Catalytic Cracking (FCC) is known for its ability to convert products considered as wastes from various refinery units into useful fuels such as gasoline and diesel. It is considered as one of the most important units of the refinery. In spite of its importance, it is also considered as the major contributor of carbon dioxide. This pollutant, CO2 comes mainly from the regeneration of spent catalyst in the regenerator. In this study, minimization of carbon dioxide exiting the dense bed of the regenerator is considered using model based techniques. The model for the regenerator dense bed was adopted from the literature for simulation. From the simulation, the exit mole fraction of carbon dioxide was found to be 16.21%. The minimized mole fraction was obtained as 15.36%. This is a 5.24% reduction on the yield of carbon dioxide which in turn will reduce the overall mass of carbon dioxide produced and released into the air or captured and stored. Any reduction achieved on carbon dioxide emission is progress made on solving the problems of global warming.
