Modern Chemistry & Applications

Abstract

Treatment of Acidic Petroleum Crude Oil Utilizing Catalytic Neutralization Technique of Magnesium Oxide Catalyst

Norshahidatul Akmar Mohd Shohaimi, Wan Azelee Wan Abu Bakar, Jafariah Jaafar and Nurasmat Mohd Shukri

The presence of naphthenic acids in crude oils has caused a major corrosion problem to the production equipment, storage and transport facilities in the petroleum industry. The level of acidity of crude oil was determined by the value of Total Acid Number (TAN) in the oil samples. Two types of crude: Petronas Penapisan Melaka Heavy Crude and Petronas Penapisan Melaka Light Crude were studied. Various parameters studied were the amount of chemical dosing, type of catalyst, different catalyst calcination temperatures, and catalyst ratio of basic metal and dopant. The basic chemical used was ammonia solution in ethylene glycol (NH3-EG) with a concentration range of 100-1000 mg/L. The best experimental condition for the possible TAN for the two samples is 1000 mg/L of NH3-EG, and the catalyst reaction must be in the range of 35-40°C. Cu/Mg (10:90)/Al2O3 catalyst successfully reduced TAN in Heavy Crude for about 84.8% while for Light Crude, TAN was reduced 66.7% with the aids of Ni/Mg (10:90)/Al2O3 catalyst. Increase concentration of basic chemical, reduced the total acid number value of both crude oil.