A parametric study of dehydrogenation of various Liquid Organic Hydrogen Carrier (LOHC) materials and its application to methanation process

Global warming is one of the arch challenges of this era mainly caused by the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Methanation process utilizes carbon dioxide and hydrogen to produce methane gas as an energy-rich fuel. To supply the hydrogen for the methanation process, LOHC could be used as a medium for long-range hydrogen transportation. However, the heat of reaction is needed to recover hydrogen from the LOHC medium. In this study, a new method to utilize the heat from the methanation process for dehydrogenation and optimum conditions are calculated for various LOHC materials. The new process designed uses an Air-Brayton cycle to generate the required high pressure as well as compensate for the LOHC dehydrogenation thermal energy requirement using a proportionate amount of methane produced. Also, the performance of various LOHC materials is compared in the proposed process. The simulation is performed via Aspen Plus® simulator. Dibenzyltoluene is found to be the best selection among the selected LOHC materials for use in this process with a system efficiency of 46.7% with a 100% medium recovery. Pyrrole group LOHC exhibits lower dehydrogenation temperature and energy requirement however are prone to bond scission and generally toxic. Toluene has high volatility resulting in its maximum recovery limited to 96.2% at an elevated pressure of 7 bar decreasing to 84.5% at 1 bar and 30 °C with a system efficiency of 49.08% and a low CVA of 36.74%, while NEC has 63.78% CVA with 55.64% efficiency and DBT has 54.12% CVA with 47.99% efficiency.