Enhancing hydrogen production by dry reforming process with strontium promoter

Hydrogen is an ideal energy carrier and can play a very important role in the energy system. The present study investigated the enhancement of hydrogen production from catalytic dry reforming process. Two catalysts namely Ni/γ-Al₂O₃ and Co/γ-Al₂O₃ promoted with different amounts of strontium were used to explore selectivity and yield of hydrogen production. Spent and fresh catalysts were characterized using techniques such as BET, XRD, H₂-TPR, CO₂-TPD, TGA and O₂-TPO. The catalyst activity and characterization results displayed stability improvement due to addition of Sr promoter. The least coke formations i.e. 3.8 wt% and 5.1 wt% were obtained using 0.75 wt% Sr doped in Ni/γ-Al₂O₃ and 0.5 wt% Sr doped in Co/γ-Al₂O₃ catalysts respectively. Time on stream tests of promoted catalysts for about six hours at 700 °C showed stable hydrogen selectivity. Moreover, the hydrogen selectivity was significantly improved by the addition of Sr in Ni and Co based catalysts. For instance the hydrogen selectivity increased from 45.9% to 47.8% for Ni/γ-Al₂O₃ and from 48% to 50.9% for Co/γ-Al₂O₃ catalyst by the addition of 0.75 wt% Sr in Ni/γ-Al₂O₃ and 0.5 wt% Sr in Co/γ-Al₂O₃ catalyst respectively.