Hydrogen Production from Gaseous Fuels by Plasmas - A Review
J. Mizeraczyk1, K. Urashima2, M. Jasinski3, and M. Dors3
1Department of Marine Electronics, Gdynia Maritime University, Poland
2NISTEP, Nagoya University, Japan
3Centre for Plasma and Laser Engineering, The Szewalski Institute of Fluid Flow Machinery, Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland
Abstract- Nowadays development of systems for hydrogen production are of high importance. Hydrogen is more and more attractive as an efficient and environmentally friendly carrier of energy. It is considered as a promising fuel of the future hydrogen-oriented economy. There are several conventional methods of hydrogen production, e.g. methane or natural gas reforming, coal gasification, higher hydrocarbons reforming and water electrolysis. In a mass-scale (central) production these methods are well developed and their cost of hydrogen production is acceptable. However, due to the hydrogen transport and storage problems small-scale (distributed) technologies for hydrogen production are needed. In the small-scale case the objective is to develop technologies to produce hydrogen from clean, domestic resources at a production cost of $(1-2)/kg [H2] (or about 60 g (H2)/kWh) by 2020.
Recently several plasma methods have been proposed for the small-scale hydrogen production. The plasmas proposed for hydrogen production are generated by: electron beam, dielectric-barrier discharge, gliding arc, plasmatron arc and microwave discharge. Methane, natural gas and other gaseous hydrocarbons have widely been tested to obtain hydrogen (or synthesis gas). Recently vaporized liquid alcohols and hydrocarbons (e.g., methanol, ethanol or gasoline) have been tested as hydrogen precursors. Several processes are employed when gaseous or liquid hydrocarbons are used for the plasma production of hydrogen. They are: pyrolysis, dry reforming, steam reforming, partial oxidation and auto-thermal reforming. Each of these processes has its advantages and disadvantages.
This paper is a short review of the plasma methods proposed for hydrogen production mainly from gaseous fuels. The plasma methods for gaseous fuels processing to produce hydrogen are described and critically evaluated from the view point of hydrogen production efficiency defined by such parameters as the hydrogen production rate ( g(H2)/h) and energy yield ( g(H2)/(kWh)), precursor conversion degree (%) and volume hydrogen concentration in the outgas (%).
The review conclusion is aiming at answering a question: Can any plasma method for the small-scale hydrogen production approach such challenges as the production energy yield of 60 g(H2)/kWh, high production rate, high reliability and low investment cost.
Keywords- Hydrogen production, plasma, methane reforming