(558g) Small Scale Production of H2 Via Autothermal Reforming in an Adiabatic Packed Bed Reactor

To reduce the emission of CO₂ in the environment, carbon-based fuels can be replaced with environmentally friendly fuels such as H₂. For this purpose, fuel processing of CH₄ is a well-known technique for H₂ production. In this work, 2-dimensional heterogeneous reactor model of autothermal reforming (ATR) of CH₄ has been developed and implemented on gPROMS model builder 4.1.0^®. The mass and energy balance equations have been incorporated in both gas and solid phase along the axial and radial direction in the packed bed reactor. The performance of ATR reactor has been investigated by observing the effects of temperature, pressure, steam to carbon ratio (S/C), oxygen to carbon ratio (O/C) and gas mass flow velocity (G_s) on CH₄ conversion, H₂ yield (wt. % of CH₄) and H₂ purity. The predicted results are compared with the thermodynamic data, developed on chemical equilibrium with application (CEA) software, and it is concluded that 823.15 K, 1.5 bar, S/C of 3.0, O/C of 0.45 and G_s of 0.15 kg m^-2s^-1 result in CH₄ conversion and H₂ purity up to 96% and 72% respectively.