Co-hydroprocessing of a mixture: Vegetable oil/n-hexadecane/4,6-dimethyldibenzothiophene for the production of sustainable hydrocarbons. A kinetic modeling

• It was obtained a fuel rich in paraffins which can be used to improve cetane number.
• It was known the behavior of decarboxylation and decarbonylation reactions.
• It was established a mechanism of decarbonylation reaction.
• It was built a kinetic model from the reaction mechanism above.
• It was studied the best operation conditions of the co-hydroprocessing of the mixture: vegetable oil/n-hexadecane/4,6-dimethyldibenzothiophene.

Co-hydroprocessing of a mixture of nonedible Jatropha oil, n-hexadecane and 4,6-dimethyldibenzothiphene (4,6-DMDBT) over NiMo/Al2O3 commercial catalyst was studied in the temperature range 613–633 K, 8 MPa and LHSV of 0.7–2.5 h−1 in a continuous mixed flow Robinson–Mahoney Reactor. The main carboxylic acids from the feedstock undergo decarbonylation reaction, whereas the hydrodesulfurization of 4,6-DMDBT was carried out. Hydrocracking of n-C16 and the n-paraffins from the carboxylic acids was also observed. A negligible amount of cyclic hydrocarbons was produced. A high conversion level of carboxylic acids to n-paraffins was observed (81.04–99.60%). Based on the experimental results and the LHHW theory a kinetic model for the decarbonylation reaction was developed. The kinetic model parameters were obtained from the minimization of an objective function given in terms of the reaction rates and the result values are within confidence interval.

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