Benchmarking Performance of Equilibrium Fluid Catalytic Cracking Catalysts in the Catalytic Cracking of Polypropylene

The fluid catalytic cracking process, a pillar of the modern refining infrastructure, enables the conversion of high boiling fractions of crude oil to shorter, more isomerized hydrocarbons. Today, cracking catalysts are explored for a new application in converting difficult to recycle polyolefin plastics to feeds for the chemical industry. A critical factor in enabling this conversion process, especially when compared to thermal pyrolysis, will be the price of the catalytic material. The global refining industry generates large volumes of equilibrium fluid catalytic cracking catalysts (ECAT) as waste material, which might find a secondary end-of-life application as plastic cracking catalyst. In this work, we study a broad range of ECAT materials to investigate which types of ECAT materials are particularly promising polypropylene cracking catalysts. We find that an industry standard vacuum gas oil cracking activity test, namely the fluid bed simulated test method, not only predicts plastic cracking activity, but also is a very good indicator for propylene selectivity. Historical data gathered by industrial researchers might therefore prove highly useful in identifying more active and selective plastic cracking catalysts.