Development of hydrous titanium oxide catalysts for upgrading coal liquids

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 developed for use in hydrodesulfurization (HDS) and hydrodenitrogenation (HDN) of coal liquids. The unsupported (or bulk) NiMo-HTO catalyst performed well for HDS/HDN of a coal derived liquid as compared to the benchmark Shell 324 catalyst. The CoMo-HTO, while performing better than the Shell 324 catalyst, did not perform quite as well as the NiMo-HTO. In a side-by-side comparison of supported NiMo-HTO catalysts with commercial counterparts, the supported NiMo-HTO catalysts outperformed the Shell 324 and Amocat 1C catalysts on a weight of Mo basis. On a catalyst weight basis, the NiMo-HTO coated catalyst on a Shell 324 blank under performed Shell 324, while the NiMo-HTO coated catalyst on an Amocat 1C support performed as well as the Amocat 1C catalyst.