Steam methane reformation hydrogen production costs

Table 4 Steam Methane Reformer —Hydrogen Production Cost...

The analysis showed, with various "value adders" (e.g., oxygen sales and carbon-emission-offset credits), the cost of wind-source gaseous hydrogen delivered by pipelines from production point to distant markets (about 200-1000 mi.) at an untaxed wholesale energy unit cost will be competitive with market prices (in 2005) of gasoline and hydrogen fuel made from natural gas by steam methane reforms (SMRs). 

The (additional) costs of C02 capture in connection with hydrogen production from natural gas or coal are mainly the costs for C02 drying and compression, as the hydrogen production process necessitates a separation of C02 and hydrogen anyway (even if the C02 is not captured). Total investments increase by about 5%-10% for coal gasification plants and 20%-35% for large steam-methane reformers (see also Chapter 10). 

Therefore, by taking advantage of the natural gas network, onsite production of hydrogen by steam methane reforming is the likely route to achieve cost-effectiveness.13... 

In the conceptual design, the nuclear plant is a type of SFR, mixed oxide fuel, sodium cooled with power output of 240 MWt for producing 200 000 Nm /h. The schematic diagram of nuclear-heated recirculation-type membrane reformer is shown in Figure 15. The hydrogen production cost of this process is assessed to be competitive with those of the conventional, natural gas burning, steam methane reformer plants. 

As shown in Figure 12, economic evaluations for an n -of-a-kind Si-Based H2-MHR show the hydrogen-production costs are competitive with those for steam-methane reforming [10]. Economic evaluations for the HTE-based H2-MHR are currently being evaluated and will depend significantly on the unit costs for the SOE modules. Preliminary evaluations show the hydrogen-production costs for both plants to be comparable if the SOE module unit costs are approximately 500 per kW(e). 

In recent years, new concepts to produce hydrogen by methane SR have been proposed to improve the performance in terms of capital costs reducing with respect to the conventional process. In particular, different forms of in situ hydrogen separation, coupled to reaction system, have been studied to improve reactant conversion and/or product selectivity by shifting of thermodynamic positions of reversible reactions towards a more favourable equilibrium of the overall reaction under conventional conditions, even at lower temperatures. Several membrane reactors have been investigated for methane SR in particular based on thin palladium membranes [14]. More recently, the sorption-enhanced steam methane reforming (Se-SMR) has been proposed as innovative method able to separate CO2 in situ by addition of selective sorbents and simultaneously enhance the reforming reaction [15]. 

The cost of production for a steam methane reformer to produce 5 MMS-CFD of high purity hydrogen is shown in Table 4. This estimate is based on a cylindrical reformer furnace using a hydrogen PSA for hydrogen separation and purification. Capital cost is third-quarter 1996, US Gulf Coast [8]. 

Ideally, future work on the model would investigate the connection between capital cost and hydrogen production rate. For example, the capital cost of steam methane reforming may be linked to the production rate as in Equation (2), which will provide a more complicated trade-off. This type of analysis is possible with H2Sim, but requires the user to adjust capital costs to reflect the unit size. 

Steam methane reforming (SMR) is the most common and cost-effective method for hydrogen production ... 

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