High-Temp Ceramic Hydrogen Reformer From University of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 09.25.06
This breakthrough deserves a celebratory bottle of bubbly: researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) have designed very efficient ceramic micro-reactors that produce hydrogen from hydrocarbons or even ammonia. Because these ceramic "reformers" operate at a very high temperature, they can process relatively crude feedstock and not plug up with carbon. It's anticipated that their hydrogen output will be useful for running small fuel cells capable of powering small appliances, laptop computers, and rechargers for battery packs. The research paper describing the discovery is published in the Journal of Catalysis, and is available as a PDF file download here. Briefly: The researchers incorporated a structured catalyst inside a small ceramic housing, which enables the steam reforming of propane at operating temperatures up to 1,000 degrees Celsius. "Using the new ceramic housing, the researchers also demonstrated the successful decomposition of ammonia at temperatures up to 1,000 degrees Celsius." We know you biodiesel fans would love to have a way to generate electricity directly from your favorite liquid fuel, Out of the fry pan and into the generator is a possibility. Via Primidi
Um, the article talks primarily about propane as a feedstock. Why would anyone want to take a nice, transportable, liquid fuel and turn it into hydrogen?
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Because propane is widely available in a great variety of safely delivered and easily handled canisters that are USDOT registered and thus transportable by commercial and domestic carrier. But utility would not be limited to petroleum gases. Biogas would work just fine.
FYI: -- Most commercial hydrogen is "reformed" from petroleum gases. A dominant use of that H2 is gasoline refining. Most commonly methane, but ethane, butane, propane, etc are all feasible H2 sources from commercial "reformer" processes. Same goes for ammonia. WIthout natural gas reformation, nitrogen fertilizer would be a rare and very expensive item. In other words, non-organic farming, the green revolution in particular, would not exist without reformation of petroleum gases for hydrogen. It is a foundation of our society, like it or not.
That's a good question, Lloyd. I'd like to see an answer to that too.
The main reasons I can think of are that a fuel cell might be more efficient than using propane directly, and maybe to reduce end-user local emissions for sensitive areas.
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Exactly. If design life is long enough to justify the material consumption, it spreads the advantage of zero NOX, SOX, and CO emissions/milliwatt; unlike utility electrical generators which are absolutely filthy with those emissions. Fuel cells are extremely sensitive to CO and sulfur in any form and will be "poisoned" by their presence. Therefore , reformers such as this must have very clean fuels fed to them and be 100% efficient (no CO at all) in their function.