Kinetics of wet air oxidation of sodium sulfide over heterogeneous iron catalyst

Wet air oxidation (WAO) is an established technique for reducing the chemical oxygen demand (COD) of refinery sulfidic spent caustic waste. In the present work, the heterogeneous form of the cheap and abundant catalyst ferrous sulfate (FeSO₄) was employed for WAO of sodium sulfide. The performance of this catalyst in the oxidative destruction of this model compound is thus far unfamiliar. Kinetic data for the non-catalytic and catalytic oxidation processes was collected in a batch reactor. For the catalytic process, temperature (T), oxygen partial pressure () and catalyst concentration (ω) were varied in the ranges 80-150°C, 0.69-2.06 MPa and 0.8-2.4 g/L respectively. Around 94% COD was destroyed within 1 h when feed containing 8 g/L of sulfide was oxidized at T = 100°C, = 0.69 MPa, and ω = 0.8 g/L. First, the data on disappearance of COD were fitted to a power law model and reaction rate constants were determined. The activation energy for the non-catalytic (91 kJ/mol) and catalytic (50 kJ/mol) oxidation process was found from the temperature dependence of the rate constants. Second, hyperbolic models based on Langmuir-Hinshelwood (L-H) and Eley-Rideal (E-L) kinetics were used for fitting kinetic data. It was found that the L-H model suggesting dissociative adsorption of oxygen provided the best fit. In this way, a deep insight into oxidation kinetics of sodium sulfide was provided.