Patent ID: 8840778

Claim:
A method for thermally cracking a hydrocarbonaceous feedstock composed of at least one hydrocarbonaceous material, at, least one of said hydrocarbonaceous materials containing at least one carboxylic acid species, said method comprising the steps of: (a) heating said feedstock to form a preheated stream wherein the preheated stream comprises (i) a first vaporous phase; and, (ii) a first liquid phase wherein the first liquid phase comprises at least one carboxylic acid species, (b) passing said preheated stream to a vaporization unit (c) vaporizing a portion of said first liquid phase thereby creating a vaporized portion of the first liquid phase and a remaining portion of the first liquid phase wherein the remaining portion of the first liquid phase contains at least one carboxylic acid species (d) mixing the vaporized portion of the first liquid phase with said first vaporous phase to form a first vaporous product, (e) heating said remaining portion of the first liquid phase which contains at least one carboxylic acid species to form a second vaporous product and a liquid bottoms product wherein the heating step further comprises the step of: contacting said remaining portion of the first liquid phase containing at least one carboxylic acid species with at least one decarboxylation catalyst thereby converting at least part of said carboxylic acid species in said remaining portion of the first liquid phase to at least one of: a) carbon dioxide and hydrocarbon and b) lower molecular weight acids and hydrocarbon, (f) removing the liquid bottoms product wherein the liquid bottoms product is essentially free of the carboxylic acid species, and (g) passing at least part of said first and second vaporous products to at least one thermal cracking furnace.