The challenge of mercury removal from hydrocarbons has always been associated with complexity of the hydrocarbon matrix and impurities present in the mix. This has been observed when difficulty of mercury removal intensifies from natural gas to condensate. This challenge is further exacerbated by the inevitable fluctuation of feed quality and conditions of which the technology needs to withstand throughout its service. As the presence of mercury in raw natural gas condensates has been a persistent problem for decades in the oil and gas industry, an efficient, single, and low cost approach of mercury removal would be extremely beneficial to operators. A novel formulation using ionic liquids was custom-designed to overcome the issues faced by off-the-shelf products. This was achieved by providing irreversible capture of all species of mercury via introduction of oxidative functionalities. Performance of the new adsorbent was successfully demonstrated by benchmarking with other commercial technologies at laboratory and pilot scale testing. Results of pilot testing showed average mercury removal efficiency of more than 80% over a duration of 1700 hours of continuous monitoring, outperforming commercially available adsorbents. Commercial trial of the adsorbent is also underway at a secured test facility where it will be subjected to actual process and feed conditions. This innovation is the first demonstration using ionic liquid technology with a design bed life of three times longer than commercial adsorbents and enabling longer on-stream periods between adsorbent change out intervals.

Mercury removal from natural gas condensate using solid supported ionic liquid

255th National Meeting (2018)

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