1.

Burning of sulfur
1. Dry air help to avoid corrosion (presence of O2 and H2 form water) ( also forms sulfurous acid
or any other form of acid)
2. pure sulfur (free of carbonaceous impurities)
2. S to SO3 production
Burning of S gives SO2 , then going to dust chamber where we supply steam as it is an
electrostatic precipitator ; steam is ejected in high pressure from the narrow mouth of dust
chamber thus the impurities present in SO2 will precipitate.
3. Scrubber
Wet Scrubber means injecting some water. Hence any acidic impurities rather than SO2 present
will be removed (SOX,NOX)
4. Drying tower
after using wet scrubber we need to dry the feedstock. Concentrated H2SO4 is used for drying.
Sometimes SO2 contains arsenic.
5. Arsenic purifier
it is an absorption tower where arsenic is separated from SO2
6. tyndall box (tyndall effect)
We use the property of colloidal particles (tyndall effect) to make sure that SO2 is free from any
dust or impurities in tyndall box using light.
7. Catalytic bed reactor
Maximum temperature maintained at 600 degree Celsius. we do not directly supply SO2
as that would consume more energy hence we require a preheater to initially increase feed
temperature to 200 degree Celsius . Temperature range is 450 to 600 degree Celsius to avoid
the decomposition of SO3 reversible reaction.
Catalytic converter is used to produce SO3 (heart of production)
SO2, N2 and O2 are coming to first catalytic bed where vanadium pentoxide is present and we
get 75% SO3, temperature is 600 degrees Celsius. From first chamber to second chamber the gas
mixture loses 100 degrees Celsius and for subsequent chambers also. Therefore we use heat exchangers
to reheat the gas mixture by using superheated steam. In second bed we got 85% S3 and again at 3rd
bed we get 98 - 99% SO3 therefore we can conclude all SO2 is converted to SO3 and the 4th bed is kept
for backup.
SO2+O2+N2
V2O5 , 1.2 -1.5 atm
450-600 degree Celsius

75%
Heat
exchanger
Access points
1
85%
2

98-99%
SO3
 S+O2SO2

2SO2+O2↔2SO3 if temperature is low then SO3 will decompose in SO2 . but not more than
450-600 degrees Celsius. Then we will not get SO3 as it is an exothermic reaction .

We then absorb SO3 into 98-99% H2SO4 to produce oleum.

Why we need to absorb SO3 into 98-99% H2SO4?

As if we try to absorb high conc. Of SO3 into low conc. Of H2SO4 ,then mist will form due to heat
of absorption and the mist is extremely difficult to condense.hence we will lose a major part of
acid produced. Therefore we absorb SO3 into 98-99% H2SO4 to make oleum first then dilute it
to produce the H2SO4 of desired conc.

8. Effect of temperature

Since the forward reaction is exothermic at higher temperature. Increasing temperature will
favor the backward reaction or the dissociation of SO3 is more favored. However at low
temperature the rate of combination off SO2 and O2 is very slow and at higher temperature
about 450 degree Celsius the rate of formation of S3 is high and the rate of decomposition of
SO3 is minimum.

9. Effect of pressure

Kp =

Low pressure is required to be maintained as high pressure can adversely affect the reaction and also
can corrode the tower

Rate control

1. Diffusion of gases into catalyst

2. Adsorption of SO2 and O2 into catalytic bed
3. Chemical reaction in the surface of catalyst to make SO3
4. Desorption of so3 from catalyst bed to surface
5. Diffusion of gas from surface to the medium.