Upgrading of palmitic acid and hexadecanamide over Co-based catalysts: Effect of support (SiO2, γ-Al2O3 and H-ZSM-22)

This work has investigated the catalytic deoxygenation and denitrogenation of palmitic acid and hexadecanamide over supported Co catalysts to produce high yields of hydrocarbons. Palmitic acid and hexadecanamide were completely converted over Co/H-ZSM-22 catalyst with higher initial conversion rate within 10 min (0.151 and 0.036 mol L−1 h−1, respectively, for palmitic acid and hexadecanamide), compared to 0.045 and 0.027 molL−1 h−1 obtained over Co/SiO2 catalyst. Characterization results revealed that neutral SiO2 support was selective towards the hydrodecarbonylation (HDC) reaction, whereas H-ZSM-22 zeolite support with strong acid sites significantly improved the hydrodeoxygenation (HDO) and hydrodenitrogenation (HDN) reactions without carbon atom loss.