Recovery of vanadium pentaoxide and potassium sulfate from spent catalyst using ammonium sulfate

The aim of the present work was directed to investigate thoroughly, the effectiveness of extraction of vanadium oxides as well as potassium sulfate from the spent vanadium pentaoxide catalyst using ammonium sulfate as an attacking reagent, in order to avoid the use of corrosive acids. The investigation was also aimed to utilize the accumulated amounts of spent catalyst in production of vanadium pentaoxide and potassium sulfate which help in minimization of environmental pollutions arised from accumulation of the former one by times. The chemical reactions between the reactive species, resulted from thermal decomposition of ammonium sulfate and various species forming the spent catalyst at different temperatures ranged between 200-450[degree sign] C were investigated in detail the different reaction products were characterized by means of x-ray diffraction patterns as well as by electronic absorption spectra, whereas the contents of tetra-and pentavalent vanadium species were determined by volumetric methods of chemical analysis. Depending on the different results, samples of vanadium pentaoxide and potassium sulfate were prepared in pure forms from the spent catalyst