CoMo/Ti-SBA-15 catalysts for dibenzothiophene desulfurization

With a view to reducing the sulfur content in diesel fuels, novel desulfurization CoMo catalysts were supported on a Ti-loaded hexagonal mesoporous SBA-15 material. The Ti-SBA-15 substrates were synthesized using triblock copolymers as structure-directing agents. Catalytic activity was assessed in the model reaction of hydrodesulfurization (HDS) of dibenzothiophene (DBT), carried out in a batch reactor at T = 623 K and with a total hydrogen pressure of 3.1 MPa. The reaction proceeds via the direct desulfurization route (main route) and the hydrogenation (HYD) pathway. The incorporation of Ti into the SBA-15 afforded catalysts that were more active than the Ti-free counterpart, due to the enhancement of the DDS route in this reaction. This difference was explained in terms of a larger number of coordinately unsaturated sites (CUS) of the metal sulfide on Ti-loaded catalysts. Under steady-state conditions, the CoMoST20 catalyst with a Si/Ti ratio of 20 was the most active among the catalysts studied. Since this catalyst exhibited both Ti4+ ions incorporated into the SBA-15 framework and separate anatase TiO2 clusters located on its surface, the activity enhancement on this sample was explained by the larger intrinsic activity of the “Co–Mo–S” phase located on these TiO2 nanoparticles. The Ti-SBA-15 supports and the CoMo/Ti-SBA-15 catalysts were studied by N2 adsorption–desorption isotherms, XRD, TEM, FTIR of adsorbed pyridine and NO, UV–vis DRS, TPR, micro-Raman and XPS spectroscopy.