Jointly published by React.Kinet.Catal.Lett. Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest Vol. 82, No. 2, 241-246 and Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht (2004) 0133-1736/2004/US$ 20.00. © Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest. All rights reserved. RKCL4412 MAGNESIUM OXIDE AS AN EFFECTIVE CATALYST IN CATALYTIC WET OXIDATION OF H 2 S TO SULFUR Eun-Ku Lee a , Kwang-Deog Jung b* , Oh-Shim Joo b and Yong-Gun Shul a a Department of Chemical Engineering, Yonsei University, Seoul 120-749, Korea b Eco-Nano Center, Korea Institute of Science and Technology, P.O. Box 131, Cheongryang, Seoul, Korea Received September 22, 2003 In revised form January 16, 2004 Accepted January 19, 2004 Abstract Four different magnesium oxides were studied in the wet oxidation of H 2 S to sulfur. The H 2 S removal capacity of MgO in the catalytic wet oxidation strongly depends on the pore size distribution. The MgO with relatively large pores (>100 Å) showed a high removal capacity of H 2 S. It is suggested that the large pore size favors H 2 S removal in the catalytic wet oxidation due to the limitation of diffusion. Keywords: Magnesium oxide, H 2 S removal capacity, catalytic wet oxidation INTRODUCTION Hydrogen sulfide (H 2 S) originating from various sources (coal-based power plants, natural-gas processing, refineries, smelter operation) can be regarded as a major air pollutant entering the atmosphere and causing acid rain. Hydrogen sulfide is removed from industrial waste gases via the Claus process [1,2]. However, the recovery of sulfur in the Claus process is not complete, ca. 3-5 % due to the thermodynamic limitations. The catalytic step in this process is the equilibrium. 2H 2 S + SO 2 3/nS n + 2H 2 O _________________________ *Corresponding author. E-mail: ureka209@yonsei.ac.kr