Synthesis, characterization and hydrodesulfurization activity of silica-dispersed NiMoW trimetallic catalysts

Silica-dispersed NiMoW trimetallic hydrodesulfurization catalysts were prepared by deposition-precipitation method. For comparative purposes, bulk NiMoW trimetallic catalysts were obtained by co-precipitation. Silica was employed to disperse active metals for full utilization of active components and silica-dispersed NiMoW catalyst had high active metal content. BET analysis showed that silica-dispersed NiMoW trimetallic catalysts had a high surface area (165.1 m²/g) and pore volume (0.27 ml/g). Transmission electron microscopy results proved that active components were well dispersed. Hydrodesulfurization activity of silica-dispersed NiMoW catalysts was much higher than that of comparative catalysts and up to twice greater than those of commercial NiMo alumina-supported systems per gram of catalyst.