Hydrogen methane formation

The processes that have been developed for the production of synthetic natural gas are often configured to produce as much methane in the gasification step as possible thereby minimizing the need for a methanation step. In addition, methane formation is highly exothermic which contributes to process efficiency by the production of heat in the gasifier, where the heat can be used for the endothermic steam—carbon reaction to produce carbon monoxide and hydrogen. 

The highly exothermic reaction has already been mentioned. It is particularly important to realise that at the elevated temperatures employed other reactions can occur leading to the formation of hydrogen, methane and graphite. These reactions are also exothermic and it is not at all difficult for the reaction to get out of hand. It is necessary to select conditions favourable to polymer formation and which allow a controlled reaction. 

At the temperatures used in coal gasification 870°C), methane formation also occurs by hydrogenation of carbon ... 

Kinetics. Extensive studies of the kinetics of methane synthesis were reported by White and co-workers (10,11, 12, 13, 14, 15). They studied the reaction between CO and hydrogen over a reduced nickel catalyst on kieselguhr at 1 atm and 300°-350°C (10). They correlated the rate of methane formation by the equation ... 

It is obvious that one can use the basic ideas concerning the effect of alkali promoters on hydrogen and CO chemisorption (section 2.5.1) to explain their effect on the catalytic activity and selectivity of the CO hydrogenation reaction. For typical methanation catalysts, such as Ni, where the selectivity to CH4 can be as high as 95% or higher (at 500 to 550 K), the modification of the catalyst by alkali metals increases the rate of heavier hydrocarbon production and decreases the rate of methane formation.128 Promotion in this way makes the alkali promoted nickel surface to behave like an unpromoted iron surface for this catalytic action. The same behavior has been observed in model studies of the methanation reaction on Ni single crystals.129... 

The influence of electronegative additives on the CO hydrogenation reaction corresponds mainly to a reduction in the overall catalyst activity.131 This is shown for example in Fig. 2.42 which compares the steady-state methanation activities of Ni, Co, Fe and Ru catalysts relative to their fresh, unpoisoned activities as a function of gas phase H2S concentration. The distribution of the reaction products is also affected, leading to an increase in the relative amount of higher unsaturated hydrocarbons at the expense of methane formation.6 Model kinetic studies of the effect of sulfur on the methanation reaction on Ni(lOO)132,135 and Ru(OOl)133,134 at near atmospheric pressure attribute this behavior to the inhibition effect of sulfur to the dissociative adsorption rate of hydrogen but also to the drastic decrease in the... 

Ruthenium is a known active catalyst for the hydrogenation of carbon monoxide to hydrocarbons (the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis). It was shown that on rathenized electrodes, methane can form in the electroreduction of carbon dioxide as weU. At temperatures of 45 to 80°C in acidihed solutions of Na2S04 (pH 3 to 4), faradaic yields for methane formation up to 40% were reported. On a molybdenium electrode in a similar solution, a yield of 50% for methanol formation was observed, but the yield dropped sharply during electrolysis, due to progressive poisoning of the electrode. 

The broken-line curves at the top of Figure 1 represent the tendencies for surface decarburization of steels while they are in contact with hydrogen. The solid-line curves represent the tendencies for steels to decarburize internally with resultant Assuring and cracking created by methane formation. 

The work of Kikuchi et al. (123) with silica-supported catalysts also shows the high tendency of iron (370°-400°C), cobalt (330o-360°C) and nickel (330°-370°C) to catalyze fragmentation (of n-pentane) to methane. This work also showed that with cobalt and nickel, the extent of methane formation tended to decrease with increasing hydrogen partial pressure. Some data are listed in Table XII. 

Gadhe, J. B. Gupta, R. B., Hydrogen production by methanol reforming in supercritical water Suppression of methane formation. Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Research 2005, 44, 4577-4585. 

Figure 8.4 Hypothetical reaction coordinate diagrams for CO hydrogenation on Pd and Ni the dissociation of CO is more difficult on Pd, making methanol synthesis more favorable than methane formation, which requires C-0 dissociation, and is the preferred pathway on Ni...

In the first set of measurements the rate of carbon build-up on a Ni(lOO) surface was measured at various temperatures as follows (1) surface cleanliness was established by AES (2) the sample was retracted into the reaction chamber and exposed to several torr of CO for various times at a given temperature (3) after evacuation the sample was transferred to the analysis chamber and (4) the AES spectra of C and Ni were measured. Two features of this study are noteworthy. First, two kinds of carbon forms are evident - a carbidic type which occurs at temperatures < 650 K and a graphite type at temperatures > 650 K. The carbide form saturates at 0.5 monolayers. Second, the carbon formation data from CO disproportionation indicates a rate equivalent to that observed for methane formation in a H2/CO mixture. Therefore, the surface carbon route to product is sufficiently rapid to account for methane production with the assumption that kinetic limitations are not imposed by the hydrogenation of this surface carbon. 

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