Hydrotreatment of Jatropha oil over NiMoLa/Al2O3 catalyst

The non-sulfided NiMoLa/Al2O3 catalyst was developed to produce renewable C15–C18 alkanes from the hydrotreatment of Jatropha oil. The NiMoLa/Al2O3 catalysts were prepared by an impregnation method and characterized by N2-BET, XRD, XPS, TPD-Hads, CO2-TPD and TGA techniques. The straight chain alkanes ranging from C15 to C18 were the main components in the product oil. A yield of 78%, a selectivity of 94% and a conversion of 83% were obtained at 370 °C, 3.5 MPa and 0.9 h−1 over the NiMoLa/Al2O3 catalyst (La 5.0 wt%). The influence of the reaction temperature (280–400 °C) and reaction time (4–177 h) on the composition of product oil were also investigated.