Removal of Hg2+ from flue gas by petroleum thioether

Petroleum thioether showed excellent flue gas de-Hg2+ ability to control mercury reemission. Petroleum thioether was prepared with high-sulfur crude oil as raw materials and characterized by FT-IR. The thioether group content was 0.104 g/g by the potentiometric titration with lead acetate as titrant. The Hg2+ removal performance of petroleum thioether was studied in simulated flue gas. The experiment results exhibited that petroleum thioether showed excellent Hg2+ removal efficiency in flue gas without threat of mercury reemission, and the process for Hg2+ capture by petroleum thioether was exothermic and went on smoothly below 60°C. 6 M HCl could be used to regenerate petroleum thioether trapped Hg2+, and there acquired a regeneration of 89.6%, which meant this Hg2+ removal treat showed low operation cost. Moreover, the regeneration of petroleum thioether captured Hg2+ facilitated the centralized processing of mercury and prepared well for the full utilization of mercury resources.