Development of a Novel Metal Monolith Catalyst for Natural Gas Steam Reforming

Abstract

Production of hydrogen from natural gas is the most cost-effective and simplest technology for commercial hydrogen generation. Natural gas is also a likely source of hydrogen for residential fuel cell systems, due to its wide availability and ease of conversion via steam methane reforming. Although catalyst technology is available for generating hydrogen from natural gas, the design of new catalysts and new catalytic supports to overcome the limitations associated with ceramic catalyst provides an opportunity to make the conversion of natural gas to hydrogen more cost-effective. In the present study, the performance of Ni-Rh/Al 2 O 3 -CeO 2 -ZrO 2 , Ni-Rh/γ-Al 2 O 3 , and Ni-Pd/γ-Al 2 O 3 catalysts were quantitatively evaluated in terms of activity and stability using appropriate kinetic models. Catalysts were tested as powders and supported on metal foil. Results proved rhodium to be a better active agent than palladium, and catalyst activity was found to increase with the increase in rhodium loading at both atmospheric and elevated pressures. γ-Al 2 O 3 supported rhodium catalysts exhibited a better performance at a much lower rhodium loading than the Al 2 O 3 -CeO 2 -ZrO 2 supported catalysts. Mass and heat transfer advantages of the metallic support over the powder form were also established by studying the performance of this catalyst in both forms to demonstrate the potential for the use of metal structured support to achieve commercially relevant hydrogen production targets at lower residence times.

Biogas reforming for hydrogen production over mesoporous Ni2Ce1−O2 catalysts

“…Alumina is commonly used as a support but during reforming process the nickel spinel phase (NiAl 2 O 4 ) is generally formed. The formation of the nickel spinel phase could accelerate the deactivation [7]. Supports play an important role in catalytic activity due to chemical effect or interaction between the active phase and the support phase.…”

Experimental and Numerical Study of Low Temperature Methane Steam Reforming for Hydrogen Production

“…The activity of Ni-based catalysts depend on the dispersion of Ni, which is affected on the metal loading and the surface area of the support used [25,26]. It was reported that Ni-based catalysts, can be deactivated easily due to coking and sintering of Ni metal [27], however; this can be solved by optimizing the catalyst contents regarding the Ni loading levels for the selected operation conditions as discussed and studied in the current work. The catalytic methane steam reforming is a surface reaction, thus increasing the amount of active Ni, will increase the surface area, and so the activity the reforming process.…”

“…At the beginning of the reaction, the temperature of both the reaction bed and the inlet gases (CH 4 and H 2 O) are at the temperature set by the experiment. (27) Regarding the species conservation, the composition of the species is given in mass fraction terms. At the beginning of the reaction, the gases within the reactor are CH 4 and H 2 O, where the initial conditions have been set for these two species while for the other gases (H 2 , CO 2 and CO) the mass fraction is equal to zero.…”

High-throughput assessment of catalyst stability during autothermal reforming of model biogas

“…The most commonly used catalysts are nickel-and noble metal-based catalysts (Ru, Rh, Pd, Ir, Pt) [3] [4]. Noble metals present better performances since they are less prone to oxidation, coking and sintering [8], but are more expensive and hence not the preferred option. The main issues with nickel are the deactivation caused by deposition of carbon and/or sintering of metal particles [5] [6].…”