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Catalyst Pellets cracked! The strange apple sauce method

Caleva apple sauce method for catalyst pellet preparation

Over the past couple of years I have worked with a huge number of chemical engineering teams, trying to crack the optimum base for a catalyst pellet. After hours of trials and research, I am pleased to say, we’ve done it!


The spheronization process is split into 3 stage techniques, mixing, extruding and spheronizing.
Our trials demonstrate that the most important stage for a successful catalyst pellet is mixing. The choice of metal oxide, zeolite, binder, optimum H2O ratio and type of mixer is extremely important.


The trials were carried out using our ‘High Viscosity’ Caleva Multi Lab. If the mixing stage is accurately completed the other steps are easy!


The H2O content is critical - the addition of an extra 0.25 ml can change the consistency from a dry looking granulation to a useless wet slurry.


Here’s the solution….., ‘Apple Sauce’ !!!


Mix Carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) with little amounts of water until you get an ‘Apple Sauce’ consistency. Use this as your binder/H2O content and mix slowly directly with your metal oxide and zeolite.


The benefit of using CMC is that it will retain the water content required for the spheronization process. You can later burn this off, leaving the pure catalyst pellets for further testing and development.


This solution has worked for a huge variety of different zeolite and metal oxide formulations. The results have been conclusive and repeatable.


So stop struggling and give this a go! I will be happy to help you.


Aaron Quinn
aaron.quinn@caleva.com
Tel: +44 (0) 1258 471122

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