(175b) A Grey to Blue Transition and the Evolution of Traditional SMR Process

Energy Transition is necessary to avoid climate changes, save the plant and, ultimately, save ourselves. It seems hydrogen is seen as one of the most important enablers to the energy transition as it burns without producing CO2 as by-product. However hydrogen is not a source of energy, it is a vector, it means that we don’t have wells where to get it but, instead, we need to extract it from other species, kind of natural “hydrogen tanks”: these hydrogen tanks are hydrocarbons and water.

The extraction of hydrogen from hydrocarbons is nothing new for the industry: refineries, petrochemical and chemical facilities use hydrogen since ages as it is vital for their processes, for this reason there are plenty of hydrogen units installed worldwide, most of them based on the Steam Reforming process. The hydrogen produced by these units is called “grey” and has the big challenge of producing 9 to 12 tons of CO2 as by-products for each ton of produced hydrogen, CO2 that is ultimately sent to the atmosphere. So, how can we make hydrogen at scale ensuring the reduction of CO2 emissions? One solution is the so called Blue hydrogen: hydrogen produced from fossil origin feedstock in which the CO2 is removed and sequestrated for re-use or storage

We hear a lot nowadays about blue hydrogen for new applications, however this is not enough to reduce the environmental impact: a big piece of the decarbonization plan pass through the need of reducing the carbon footprint of existing facilities, and existing hydrogen units are certainly one of the most important in the industry that need to be decarbonized.

This paper summarizes the job done by Wood to evaluate, technically and economically, the decarbonization options for a base case 100,000 Nm3/h grey hydrogen unit, using pre-combustion carbon capture, post-combustion carbon capture, integration of gas heated reactors as well as combination of all these solutions.