Initial coke deposition on hydrotreating catalysts. Part II. Structure elucidation of initial coke on hydrodematallation catalysts

The 1 h coke has nearly the same H/C ratio as the KAR and represents an intermediate between heavy coke generating molecules from KAR and real coke. In the following 12 h, aromatic carbon is accumulated and aromatic rings are dealkylated but the coke is still rich in hydrogen. As the carbon deposition slows down (after 50 h) further aromatic carbon is built-up and aliphatic carbon decreases. After 120 h the hydrogenation activity of the HDM catalyst is still high and prevents the coke from getting hydrogen depleted, merely the degree of alkyl-substitution has dropped compared with the start of run. With further increase of run time, carbon deposition reaches a steady state (240 h). As the analysis of a spent HDM catalyst (6500 h) from an industrial ARDS unit shows, throughout the following months of operation the porous hydrogen rich coke is increasingly converted into highly condensed polynuclear aromatic coke. THF-extraction of the used catalysts (TOS; 1, 12, 120, and 6500 h) has mainly removed small aromatic compounds with a high degree of alkyl-substitution.