Enhancement of Hydrogen Production and Carbon Dioxide Capturing in a Novel Methane Steam Reformer Coupled with Chemical Looping Combustion and Assisted by Hydrogen Perm-Selective Membranes

Abstract

In this novel paper, application of chemical looping combustion (CLC) instead of furnace in a steam reformer assisted by Pd–Ag hydrogen perm-selective membranes (CLC-SRM) for CO2 capture and hydrogen production has been analyzed. NiO18-αAl2O3 particles have been employed as oxygen carriers in CLC-SRM. These particles have shown very high reactivity and allow for working at high temperatures in a CLC process with full methane conversion due to Ni-based oxygen carriers. In the CLC-SRM configuration, the air reactor (AR) and fuel reactor (FR) operate in fast and bubbling fluidization, respectively. In this configuration, reforming tubes are located vertically inside the AR so that methane steam reforming occurs in these fixed bed catalytic tubes that have been covered by the membranes. A steady state one-dimensional heterogeneous catalytic reaction model is applied to analyze the performance of CLC-SRM. Performance of conventional steam reformer (CSR) has been compared with CLC-SRM by investigation of import...