Production of hydrogen via conversion of hydrocarbons using a microwave plasma

Mariusz Jasiński (1) , Mirosław Dors (1) , Helena Nowakowska (1) , Gerietta V Nichipor (2) , Jerzy Mizeraczyk (1, 3)

1 The Szewalski Institute of Fluid-Flow Machinery
2 Joint Institute of Power and Nuclear Research
3 Department of Marine Electronics

In this paper, results of hydrogen production from hydrocarbons in the atmospheric pressure microwave plasma are presented. As sources of hydrogen, both methane CH 4 and tetrafluoroethane C 2 H 2 F 4 were tested. A new waveguide-based nozzleless cylindertype microwave plasma source was used to convert hydrocarbons into hydrogen. The processed gaseous hydrocarbons were introduced to the plasma by four gas ducts which 2 formed a swirl flow in the plasma reactor. The absorbed microwave power was up to 5 kW. The gas flow rate was up to 212 l min -1. The hydrogen mass yield rate and the corresponding energetic hydrogen mass yield were up to 866 g[H 2 ] h -1 and 577 g [ H 2 ] per kWh of microwave energy absorbed by the plasma, respectively. These parameters are better than our previous results when nitrogen was used as a swirl gas and much better than those typical for other plasma methods of hydrogen production (electron beam, gliding arc, plasmatron).

Keywords: microwave plasma; hydrogen production; conversion of hydrocarbons

Mariusz Jasiński, Mirosław Dors, Helena Nowakowska, Gerietta V Nichipor, Jerzy Mizeraczyk. Production of hydrogen via conversion of hydrocarbons using a microwave plasma. Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, 2011, 44 (19), pp.194002. ⟨10.1088/0022-3727/44/19/194002⟩. ⟨hal-00615135⟩