Abstract: Ni-W/Al2O3 catalyst was prepared by loading Ni-W metals on Al2O3 support，and Ni-W/Al2O3–AT catalyst was prepared by post-treating the uncalcinated Ni-W/Al2O3 catalyst prepared with glycol solution. The physicochemical properties of the post-treated catalysts were characterized by XRD, H2-TPR, TEM, XPS and UV Raman spectroscopy (LRS). The results show that ethylene glycol not only promotes W species to form octahedral coordinated multi-core poly tungsten acid by improving the distribution of hydroxyl on the Al2O3 support surface, but also increases the dispersion and sulfidation degree of W species on the Ni-W/Al2O3–AT catalyst by weakening the interaction between Al2O3 support and active metals, resulting in more “Ni-W-S” active phase and higher hydrogenation performance of post-treated catalyst. The Ni-W/Al2O3–AT catalyst shows higher HDS, HDN and aromatics saturation performance than that of Ni-W/Al2O3 catalyst for the light coking VGO of Zhoushan petrochemical Co. The sulfur and nitrogen contents can be reduced from 6 850 μg/g and 3 720 μg/g in feed to 10 μg/g and 12 μg/g in product, respectively, the aromatics with ≥2 rings are reduced from 25.8% to 3.2%.

Key words: ethylene glycol, Ni-W/Al2O3, hydrodenitrogenation, light coking VGO, catalyst