Novel nickel catalyst deposited on nanoporous carbon was found to be an efficient catalyst for the epoxidation of simple alkenes with $O_2$ and isobutyraldehyde under mild conditions. Alkenes exhibited different reactivities towards Ni-catalyst and epoxidation with stilbene proceeds stereospecifically. This may be rationalized with the mechanism involving coordinated acylperoxy radical intermediate. Nickel contents depend on the preparative methods and the KNI-3 catalyst, which was synthesized by wet impregnation of $Ni(NO_3)_2$ into nanoporous carbon, shows the highest activity. The activity of the catalyst is well correlated with contents of nickel. Recycled catalysts suffer considerable loss of activity due to leaching of catalytic active species, nickel.