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Upgrading renewables, secondary, and waste streams through innovative hydroprocessing catalysts and reaction pathways

Problem statement

Hydroprocessing is a well-implemented and versatile refinery conversion strategy, comprising a wide array of reaction routes such as: (i) hydrotreating, aiming for the hydrogenation of unsaturated hydrocarbons and the removal (hydrogenolysis) of heteroatoms such as sulfur or nitrogen; (ii) hydrocracking, for promoting C–C bond scission and the partial saturation of aromatics; or (iii) hydrodeoxygenation, for the specific removal of oxygen moieties. In this project, we investigate the conversion of highly polyaromatic feedstock like heavy fuel oil (HFO), pyrolysis fuel oil (PFO), or bio-oils from different biomass sources (i.e., agricultural waste, algae) for quality improvement and obtaining products with higher added value.

We seek new (thermo-) catalytic strategies and improved heterogeneous catalysts with increased activity and stability. We put advanced analytical characterization techniques (i.e., nuclear magnetic resonance, high-res mass spectrometry) to work and combine their results with modeling and statistical tools.

Goals

  • Develop a quantitative analytical workflow to analyze and interpret these complex reacting environments
  • Explore novel renewable and waste resources to obtain chemicals and fuels
  • Deploy ad-hoc catalysts and process conditions to incorporate these wastes in the refinery (bio- and waste-refinery)
  • Analyze process dynamics and kinetics
HPC

Related People

Gontzal Lezcano
Idoia Hita

Related Publications

Petcoke-derived Functionalized Activated Carbon as Support in a Bifunctional Catalyst for Tire Oil Hydroprocessing

by Hita, Palos, Arandes, Hill, Castaño
Fuel Process. Technol. Year: 2016

Abstract

The catalytic performance of three NiMo catalysts supported on tailored activated carbon (AC) supports has been studied for the hydroprocessing of tire oil for sulfur removal and conversion of heavier fractions towards lighter naphtha and diesel production. The supports have been obtained through physical activation of petcoke for different times, and in some cases functionalized via acid treatment with HNO3. The hydroprocessing runs have been carried out in a fixed bed reactor working in trickle bed regime at 275–375 °C, 65 bar and a space time of 0.16 h. The catalyst properties have been measured by ICP-AES, N2 adsorption–desorption isotherms, TPR, and tert-butylamine adsorption–desorption (TPD). A preliminary catalyst screening using a synthetic mixture of model compounds of tire oil was used to select the most active catalyst. This catalyst, which contained a support activated for 9 h and functionalized with HNO3, had an HDS conversion of up to 99.9%. In the hydroprocessing of real tire oil, the same NiMo/AC catalyst reached a steady sulfur removal of 96.3% and a heavy gasoil lump removal higher than 11 wt%, with complete olefin hydrogenation and a decreased content of naphthenes and aromatics in the products. The cetane number of the diesel fraction was also enhanced with this catalyst.

Keywords

HPC HCE W2C