The worldwide demand of fuels is expected to continue growing in the next decade. To satisfy these requirements and to respect more stringent regulations, the petroleum industry has to face the challenge of upgrading the heavier cuts into valuable products like diesel. Conversion of Vacuum Gas Oil (VGO) or Vacuum Residu (VR) into transportation fuels by fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) or hydrocracking (HCK) has thus become a major issue for the refining industry.<br/>Due to the presence of significant amounts of heteroatomic compounds that can be detrimental to the hydrocracking catalysts, the HCK process includes a hydrotreatment (HDT) step which aims at purifying the feed before entering the hydrocracking reactor thanks to hydrodearomatization, hydrodesulfurization and hydrodenitrogenation reactions. Thus, the understanding hydrotreatment requires a detailed characterization of the cuts as well as their hydrotreated products, especially the distribution of main chemical families (paraffins, naphthenes, aromatics, heteroatomic compounds).<br/>The complexity of oil and petroleum samples offers a significant challenge to the analytical chemist. Currently, the mass spectrometric instrument of choice for complex hydrocarbon or petrochemical samples is FTICR-MS, due to its ultra-high mass resolution capabilities. However, exact mass data alone cannot fully characterise the sample. Coupling ion mobility with QTof MS offers an additional, orthogonal mode of separation, and can also provide information about an ion’s size and shape.<br/>It is actually known that some molecules were refractory towards the HDT process (such as nitrogen containing compounds) and the aim of our work is to reach a better understanding of the reactions involved in hydrotreatment. Analyzing the feed and product of HDT by the combination of FT-ICR/MS and IMS/MS techniques allows the characterization (molecular formulae and collision cross sections) of reaction descriptors. The explaination of the difference of reactivity between two crudes towards HDT process resids in the structure of the molecules (such as the 4,6 dimethyl dibenzothiophene for the HDS of diesel cuts).<br/>These developments open up exciting perspectives for a better understanding of the reactions involved in hydrotreatment.

Comparisons and structural characterization of petroleum cut samples from different origins: Impact of hydrotreatment processes

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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