• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.337-343
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• 2007

The reforming catalyst and the electrodes in fuel cells can be poisoned by the organic sulfur compound which is added as an odorant for checking out the leakage of natural gas, and that makes a big problem of system degradation. In this study, various adsorbents, such as silica, ${\gamma}$-alumina, activated carbon, HZSM-5, Ultra-stable Y zeolite (USY), and beta zeolite (BEA), were utilized to remove tetra-hydrothiophene (THT) and tert-butylmercaptan (TBM), and to confirm the performance in the adsorption of those odorants by using a continuous adsorptive bed. The effects of Si/Al ratio of zeolites, adsorption temperature and the type of balance gas (methane or He) on the adsorption performance in the packed bed have been investigated. In addition, the competitive adsorption between TBM and THT on the adsorbents was also estimated. The result shows that H-type BEA zeolite exhibited the highest adsorption capacity for TBM and THT odorant, and the higher amount of THT was removed adsorptively on the same adsorbent than TBM. The physical and chemical adsorption of those compounds on acid sites of zeolite were confirmed by temperature programmed desorption (TPD) and infrared spectrum (IR) analyses.