Double-stage chemical looping combustion combined with sorption enhanced natural gas steam reforming process for hydrogen and power cogeneration: Thermodynamic investigation

Abstract Chemical looping combustion (CLC) is a high efficiency and clean power generation system. With the principle of energy cascade utilization and methodology of system integration, a cogeneration system for hydrogen and power from natural gas was proposed by thermally coupling high-pressure (HP) and low-pressure (LP) double-stage CLC and sorption-enhanced steam reforming unit. The effects of operating parameters on the different performances indicators (including product gas concentration, H 2 yield, and CH 4 conversion) were investigated. The proposed novel process and a benchmark cogeneration process (i.e., natural gas CLC combustion unit along with sorption-enhanced steam reforming process) were both evaluated and compared from a thermodynamic point of view. Results show that increasing the Fuel HP / C and Fuel LP / C ratio (i.e., natural gas as fuel for HP-/LP-CLC divided by the feed molar flow for reformer ratio) leads significantly in improving the H 2 yield and CH 4 conversion. The addition of Ca-based sorbent and steam in reformer also has positive impacts on system performances. Under the conditions of Fuel HP / C  = 0.42 and Fuel LP / C  = 0.70, the novel process has a H 2 concentration of 92%, H 2 yield of 3.64, and CH 4 conversion of 75%, while for the benchmark process, the H 2 concentration is 89%, H 2 yield is 3.55, and has a CH 4 conversion of 69%. In addition, the optimized process minimizes exergy destruction and increases exergy efficiency over 6% when compared to the base-case system.

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