Tracking Catalytic Esterification of Naphthenic Acids in Crude Oil by ESI FT-ICR MS

The catalytic esterification reaction was used to decrease total acid number (TAN) of crude oil by converting naphthenic acids to naphthenic acid esters in the presence of Zn-Al hydrotalcite used as the catalyst and glycol used as the reactant. The crude oil and its corresponding esterified oil were characterized by the negative-ion electrospray ionization (ESI) Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (FT-ICR MS). Six acidic class species, O2, O1, N1, N2, N1O1 and N1O2 were assigned in the negative-ion spectrum both in the crude oil and its esterified oil. Among the identified acidic compounds, the O2 class was dominant. The relative abundance of O2 class species was much higher than other acidic class species in crude oil, while it was significantly decreased after esterification. The most abundant O2 class species had a carbon number of 30-34 and a double-bond equivalence (DBE) value of 5 before and after esterification. It could be concluded that the naphthenic acids in crude oil can be esterified to lower its TAN value, and each of them seems to exhibit identical esterification efficiency approximately due to the similar DBE versus the -carbon number distribution before and after esterification.