Hydroisomerization of model FCC naphtha over sulfided Co(Ni)-Mo(W)/MCM-41 catalysts

Deep hydrodesulfurization (HDS) of gasoline generally brings about the saturation of olefins and leads to the serious octane number losses. Conversion of linear olefins to branched ones followed by hydrogenation to isoalkanes would minimize such octane number losses. In this work, MCM-41-supported Co-Mo, Ni-Mo and Ni-W catalysts were prepared by the incipient wetness impregnation method, and compared with an industrial Co-Mo/gamma-Al2O3 catalyst. The Surface acidities were measured by the techniques of microcalorimetry and infrared spectroscopy for the adsorption of ammonia, and probed by the reaction of conversion of isopropanol. The isomerization and hydrogenation of I-hexene as well as the HDS of thiophene were studied by using model FCC naphtha. It was found that the sulfidation enhanced significantly the surface Bronsted acidity that favored the skeletal isomerization of 1-hexene under the HDS conditions. Since the isomerization and hydrogenation of 1-hexene are the two competition reactions, the catalysts with relatively lower hydrogenation activity may have higher selectivity to the isomerization reactions. The Co-Mo/MCM-41 showed the high selectivity to the skeletal isomerization reactions due to its strong Surface Bronsted acidity and the relatively low hydrogenation activity. On the other hand, the Ni-Mo/MCM-41 exhibited high hydrogenation activity and therefore low selectivity to the isomerization reactions although it possessed quite strong surface Bronsted acidity. The Ni-W/MCM-41 exhibited the low activity for the HDS of thiophene and isomerization of 1-hexene due to the poor dispersion of active metals. (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.