L'air Liquide, Societe Anonyme Pour L'etude Et L'exploitation Des

Bertrand Mollaret

Daniel Gary

Jean-Yves Thonnelier

Jean Louise

Process for preparing ultra-pure nitrogen containing less than 100 ppb (parts per billion) impurities, characterized in that at least the impurities consisting of carbon monoxide (CO) and/or hydrogen (H.sub.2) are removed by passing the gas from which at least one of these two components has to be removed, over a bed of particles including a metallic element namely copper (Cu) and/or ruthenium (Ru) and/or rhodium (Rh) and/or palladium (Pd) and/or osmium (Os) and/or iridium (Ir) and/or platinum (Pt) supported on a particulate support, by the technique of ion exchange and/or by the technique of impregnation. This technique enables to produce ultra-pure nitrogen by using it either with nitrogen obtained by distillation, or air to be distilled as an additional step for the removal of CO.sub.2 and H.sub.2 O. A device for carrying out the process constitutes another object of the invention.

Apparatus for preparing ultra-pure nitrogen

Process and apparatus for preparing ultra-pure nitrogen containing less than 100 ppb (parts per billion) impurities, characterized in that at least the impurities consisting of carbon monoxide (CO) and/or hydrogen (H.sub.2) are removed by passing the gas from which at least one of these two components has to be removed, over a bed of particles including a metallic element namely copper (Cu) and/or ruthenium (Ru) and/or rhodium (Rh) and/or palladium (Pd) and/or osmium (Os) and/or iridium (Ir) and/or platinum (Pt) supported on a particulate support, by the technique of ion exchange and/or by the technique of impregnation. This technique enables to produce ultra-pure nitrogen by using it on air to be distilled as an additional step for the removal of CO.sub.2 and H.sub.2 O.

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Viroflay, France

Bertrand Mollaret