Hydrogen Production from Biomass

Approximately 95% of the hydrogen produced today comes from carbonaceous raw material, primarily fossil in origin. Only a fraction of this hydrogen is currently used for energy purposes the bulk serves as a chemical feedstock for petrochemical, food, electronics, and metallurgical processing industries. 

With the growing concern about global climate change, alternatives to the atmospheric release of C02 are being studied. Sequestration of the C02 is an option that could provide a viable near-term solution. 

It must also be recognized that as with all sources of hydrogen, production from biomass will require appropriate hydrogen storage and utilization systems to be developed and deployed. 

Biomass conversion technologies can be divided into direct production technology routes and technologies aimed at the conversion of storable intermediates. Direct routes have the advantage of simplicity. Indirect routes have additional production steps, but have an advantage in that there can be distributed production of the intermediates, minimizing the transportation costs of the biomass. Intermediates can be 

A third area of hydrogen from biomass is metabolic processing to split water via photosynthesis or to perform the shift reaction by photo biological organisms. This is an area of long-term research. 

---

Hydrogen production from biomass>ethanol at ambient temperature with novel diaphragm reactor... 

Hydrogen Production from Biomass-Derived Methanol.213... 

Demirbas, A., Hydrogen production from biomass by the gasification process. Energy Sources 2002, 24, 59. 

Both the production of hydrogen from coal and the production of oil from unconventional resources (oil sands, oil shale, CTL, GTL) result in high C02 emissions and substantially increase the carbon footprint of fuel supply, unless the C02 is captured and stored. While the capture of C02 at a central point source is equally possible for unconventionals and centralised hydrogen production, in the case of hydrogen, a C02-free fuel results, unlike in the case of liquid hydrocarbon fuels. This is all the more important, as around 80% of the WTW C02 emissions result from the fuel use in the vehicles. If CCS were applied to hydrogen production from biomass, a net C02 removal from the atmosphere would even be achievable. 

Demirbas, A. 2005b. Hydrogen production from biomass via supercritical water extraction. Energy Sources 27 1409-1417. 

Yan, Q., Guo, L., Lu, Y. 2006. Thermodynamic analysis of hydrogen production from biomass gasification in supercritical water. Energy Convers Manage 47 1515-1528. 

Ni, M., Eeung, D.Y.C., Eeung, M.K.H., Sumalty, K. 2006. An overview of hydrogen production from biomass. Euel Proc Technol 87 461 72. 

In the US, the plan for 2010 is to develop and demonstrate technology to supply purified hydrogen for PEMFC from biomass at US 2.60/kg at the plant gate (projected to a commercial scale 75,000 kg/day). The objective is to be competitive with gasoline by 2015. There is also a Hydrogen Production from Biomass program" funded at US 1.2 million, which includes pyrolysis, gasification and fermentation. 

Hydrogen production from fossil fuels will continue for the foreseeable future, given the large resource and the established industrial base. Research is focused on improving the environmental aspects of fossil fuel use, and a number of papers address advanced hydrogen production technologies that reduce or eliminate C02 emissions from the production process. In addition, hydrogen production from biomass, a renewable resource with the potential for zero net C02 emissions, is discussed. 

HYDROGEN PRODUCTION FROM BIOMASS AND BY PH0T0BI0L0GICAL PROCESSES... 

Coproduction (biorefinery) of, for example, phenolic adhesives, polymers, waxes, and other products with hydrogen production from biomass is being discussed in the context of biomass gasification plant designs to improve the overall economics of biomass-to-hydrogen conversion.11 The technical and economic viability of such coproduction plants is unproven and was not considered in this analysis. 

Hydrogen production from biomass is an attractive technology, as the primary energy is solar (i.e., renewable ), with... 

Claassen, P.A.M., van Groenestijin, J.W., Janssen, A.J.H., van Niel, E.W.J., and Wijffels, R.H. 2000. Feasibility of biological hydrogen production from biomass for utilization in fuel cells. In Proceedings of the 1st World Conference and Exhibition on biomass for energy and industry, Sevilla, Sapin, 5-9 June 2000. 

Turn, S. Kinoshita, C. Zhang, Z. Ishimura, D. Zhou, J. (1998) An Experimental Investigation of Hydrogen Production from Biomass Gasification. Int. J. Hydrogen Energy, 23, 641-648. 

Hydrogen production from biomass by low temperature catalytic gasiflcation... 

Florin N, Harris A (2007) Hydrogen production from biomass. Environmentalist 27 207-215... 

Fig. 9-8 Integrated system for hydrogen production from biomass, from [70]...

---