Solar-thermal dissociation of methane in a fluid-wall aerosol flow reactor

Experimental analysis of direct thermal methane cracking

“…The outlined rationale led to the initiation of a research project at CIEMAT with the support of UPM and Vacuum During the development of the project, two types of furnaces were used to obtain worthy data about the methane decomposition reaction that take place when a technology without catalysts based on direct methane heating is applied, as suggested by many authors [6,24,27,28]. The first furnace was able to heat a gas mixture up to 1100 °C.…”

“…In the solar field, very high sunlight concentration factors (about 3000) are needed to reach temperatures over 1500 K [3,[22][23][24][25][26]. There are already some designs and experimental set-ups that could be useful for long-term generation of H 2 [27].…”

Model predictive control of a solar-thermal reactor

“…Some examples include the production of hydrogen through thermochemical water-splitting cycles [5] [6], the decarbonization of fossil fuels to produce hydrogen (solar reforming) [7], and the steam gasification of carbonaceous materials to produce synthesis gas [8].…”

“…If it is determined that the cloud will not cover the sun, the speed and direction of the second closest cloud are calculated using Eqns. (3-7) and (3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8). The direction of the second closest cloud is used to determine if this cloud will cover the sun.…”

“…A time stamp of this moment is also recorded and is used in further calculations as it will be shown below. Instead of using Equations (3-7) and (3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8) to determine the speed and direction of the cloud, these variables are assumed to remain constant while the cloud is inside the shadow band region. The distance of the closest border to the sun is estimated using the following expression:…”