THERMOCATALYTIC CO2- FREE PRODUCTION OF HYDROGEN FROM HYDROCARBON FUELS

The main objective of this project is the development of an economically viable thermocatalytic process for production of hydrogen and carbon from natural gas or other hydrocarbon fuels with minimal environmental impact. The three major technical goals are: (i) to accomplish efficient production of hydrogen and carbon via sustainable catalytic decomposition of methane or other hydrocarbons using inexpensive, durable catalysts, (ii) to obviate the concurrent production of CO/CO2 byproducts and drastically reduce (preferably, eliminate) CO2 emissions from the process, and (iii) to produce valuable carbon products in order to reduce the cost of hydrogen production The approach is based on thermocatalytic decomposition of hydrocarbons over carbon-based catalysts in an air/water-free environment. The important feature of the process is that the reaction is catalyzed by carbon particulates produced in the process, so no external catalyst is required (except for the start-up operation). This results in the following advantages: (1) no CO/CO2 byproducts are generated during hydrocarbon decomposition stage, (2) no expensive catalysts are used in the process, (3) no catalyst regeneration is required (in contrast to metal catalyst-based processes), (4) several valuable forms of carbon can be produced in the process depending on the process conditions (e.g., turbostratic carbon, pyrolytic graphite, spherical carbon particles, carbon filaments etc.), (5) CO2 emissions could be drastically reduced (compared to conventional processes). The following is a brief description of major findings: