Hydrogen production via steam gasification of heavy oil: Effects of operating conditions

A heavy oil gasification model that can predict the hydrogen yield has been developed for a high pressure circulating fluidized bed. The model is based on the Aspen Plus package, which is a professional software for simulation of thermal process. To illustrate the effects of the steam/fuel ratio and temperature, several conditions have been examined. The results show that the gasification temperature plays a major role in the process. As gasification temperature increases from 600 to 800°C, the production of hydrogen increases dramatically. The influence of steam/fuel ratio (0.50–0.80) is also considerable, but shows a constant rate at the higher steam/fuel. Simulation results were validated against experimental data available in the literature.