Co-Processing of Lignin and Petroleum Compounds on a Mesoporous Silica Catalyst-TOSCA

Co-processing is used to produce drop-in fuel from biomass-derived compounds without requiring major changes or modifications of existing reactors. In this context, oxygen removal through hydrodeoxygenation (HDO) is an important process for utilisation of lignin compounds. Whereas for petroleum hydrotreating process, most atoms to be removed are sulphur via hydrodesulphurisation (HDS). We have previously studied the interaction of lignin compounds on a molybdenum-clay based HDO catalyst and found that adsorption via H-bonding is essential to prevent carbon deposition that leads to catalyst deactivation. We now wish to extend the work using a co-processing scheme which involves both HDO and HDS. In this work, adsorption studies of lignin compound (guaiacol) and organic sulphur model compound (benzethiol) will be studied by inelastic neutron scattering (INS) to understand the interaction and possibility of catalytic mechanism of simultaneous C-O and C-S cleavage on the catalyst surface.