In this paper, the kinetics of the tail end selective hydrogenation of
a C-3 cut over palladized alumina catalyst have been studied. In the
absence of finite transport limitations, experiments have been carried
out to analyse the influence of methylacetylene (MA) and propadiene (
PD) content in the feed, hydrogen/MAPD molar ratio, temperature and sp
ace time on the corresponding conversion and selectivity. The main aim
of this process is to improve propylene yield by removing MAPD in the
propylene rich cut. The experiments were performed in an integral plu
g flow and the integral method was used for the kinetic analysis. The
minimization of the objective function was made by the Marquardt algor
ithm for multiple response and the continuity equation set integrated
by fourth order Runge-Kutta technique. The most adequate models were t
he power law type for the experimental range. The comparison between e
xperimental and observed values of the MAPD, propylene and propane mol
ar fraction in the hydrocarbon mixture, which were used for the minimi
zation, confirm the suitability of the fit.