Hydrodesulfurization process employing a guard chamber

Abstract From the Canadian patent

Abstract of the Disclosure, A process for hydrodesulfurizing a residual oil by passing the oil downwardly through a catalytic reaction zone at a hydrogen pressure which is sufficiently high that demetallization occurs rapidly so that at end-of-run the upstream catalyst region is more nearly metals-saturated than the downstream catalyst region. At the end of the catalyst cycle, the more nearly metals-saturated upstream portion of the catalyst is removed from the process while the less nearly metals-saturated downstream portion of the catalyst is passed to a guard chamber where during further operation of the process it approaches metals-saturation. In this manner no, portion of catalyst is …