Pyrolysis kinetics and residue characteristics of petrochemical industrial sludge

This study investigated the pyrolysis characteristics of sludge from wastewater treatment plants in the petrochemical industry and focused on the pyrolysis kinetics, elemental composition of residue, and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) of exhaust gas. As pyrolysis temperature increased to 773 K, the increasing rate of crude oil production tended to a stable condition. The result indicated that the optimal temperature of crude oil and water mixed production was 773 K. When pyrolysis temperature increased from 673 to 973 K, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen concentrations of residue decreased and the sulfur concentration of residue increased. The concentrations of benzene, toluene,ethylbenzene, and styrene increased by the increasing pyrolysis temperature. We found that the reaction order of sludge pyrolysis was 2.5 and the activation energy of the reaction was 11.06 kJ/mol. We believe that our pyrolysis system is transitional between devolatilization and combustion.