Résumé:
ABSTRACT
Since mercury was detected in LPG deposits, it has never caused major damage in cryogenic
equipment such as it did in the Skikda complex in 1973. The birth of the problem gave rise to
several studies directed by Sonatrach in collaboration with other foreign companies. All the
work resulted in mercury corrosion of the facilities designed with aluminum alloys. Thus it
could be confirmed that mercury can exert a catastrophic type of corrosion on aluminum.
Following these observations, it was essential to avoid any contact between the aluminum
alloys and this said mercury. The elimination of the corrosive product seemed to be the most
suitable solution. In fact, several trapping masses have been tested and a whole
demercurization technology has been developed.
Our work falls into this context, for that, and as an initiation, we tried to give initially the
mercury contents in the various world deposits of natural gas in order to locate those of
Algeria. We then listed the different physicochemical properties of mercury in order to know
its harmful effects on aluminum and to understand the mechanism of its destructive reactions.
In the fourth part, we have summarized the different mercury analysis techniques with their
advantages, disadvantages and detection limits. These techniques use cutting-edge
technologies given the infinitely small quantities they must detect. Finally, separate methods
for removing mercury present in natural gas have been presented.These methods are classified
into two main families: Methods using non-regenerable trapping masses which are the most
common and those using regenerable trapping masses which are little used.
Within the framework of our study, we opted for the second choice because we have, in our
laboratory, the know-how of a material of high performance and great absorption capacities.
Namely, zeolites, which are able to conquer any product in this field.
