Comparison of nickel molybdenum hydrous metal oxides with commercial catalysts for HDS/HDN of coal liquids

摘要

Improved efficiency in direct coal liquefaction processes can be obtained by developing catalysts with better activity, selectivity, and life. In previous exploratory research at Sandia National Laboratories, catalysts prepared via hydrous metal oxide (HMO) ion exchangers have been shown to have potential for application to a number of reactions associated with the conversion of coal to liquid fuels. In the present effort, one member of this class of catalysts, hydrous titanium oxide (HTO), has been used to develop catalysts for hydrodesulfurization (HDS) and hydrodenitrogenation (HDN) of coal liquids. For HYD of pyrone, unsupported NiMoHTO catalysts performed better than commercial benchmark catalysts on either a catalyst weight or active metals basis. In a side-by-side comparison of supported NiMoHTO catalysts with commercial counterparts, the supported NiMoHTO catalysts outperformed the Shell 324 and Amocat 1C catalysts for HYD of pyrene. For HDS/HDN of coal liquids, the supported and bulk forms of the NiMoHTO catalysts equaled the performance of the commercial catalysts at 500, 1000, and 1500 psig while containing less active metals. Possible reasons for the high activity of the NiMoHTO catalysts are a high dispersion of the active MoS(sub 2) phase and a high acidity of the bulk NiMoHTO.