High pressure hydrocracking of vacuum gas oil to middle distillates

Abstract

Hydrocracking of heavier petroleum fractions into lighter ones is of increasing importance today to meet the huge demand, particularly for gasoline and middle distillates. Much work on hydrocracking of a gas oil range feed stock to mainly gasoline using modified zeolite catalyst-base exchanged with metals (namely Ni, Pd, Mo, etc.) has been reported. In India, however, present demand is for a maximum amount of middle distillate. The present investigation was therefore aimed to maximize the yield of middle distillate (140–270°C boiling range) by hydrocracking a vacuum gas oil (365–450°C boiling range) fraction from an Indian Refinery at high hydrogen pressure and temperature. A zeolite catalyst-base exchanged with 4.5% Ni was chosen for the reaction. A high pressure batch reactor with a rocking arrangement was used for the study. No pretreatment of the feed stock for sulphur removal applied as the total sulphur in the feed was less than 2%. The process variables studied for the maximum yield of the middle distillate were temperature 300–450°C, pressure 100–200 bar and residence period 1–3 h at the feed to catalyst ratio of 9.3 (wt/wt). The optimum conditions for the maximum yield of 36% middle distillate of the product were: temperature 400°C, pressure 34.5 bar (initially) and residence period 2 h. A carbon balance of 90–92% was found for each run.