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10 - Hydrogen production

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2010

By
Michael Ball ,
Werner Weindorf  and
Ulrich Bünger
Edited by
Michael Ball  and
Martin Wietschel
Michael Ball
Affiliation:
Shell, The Netherlands
Martin Wietschel
Affiliation:
Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research, Karlsruhe, Germany
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Summary

This chapter provides an overview of the various hydrogen production methods. In this respect, the chapter aims especially at outlining the technical fundamentals of the most important commercial processes of hydrogen production and quantifying their technical and economic parameters, which are used in the context of modelling the build-up of a hydrogen infrastructure in Chapter 14. Novel hydrogen-production technologies that still require basic research are also briefly addressed. The chapter finishes with an assessment of the availability of industrial surplus hydrogen as a potential hydrogen source for the transition phase towards its widespread use as vehicle fuel.

Overview of production processes

Since hydrogen only occurs naturally in a bonded form, it first has to be released from its various compounds by using energy. Hydrogen can be produced from all primary energy sources. Figure 10.1 shows an overview of the various relevant hydrogen-production processes and the respective primary energy sources used, differentiated into renewable and non-renewable sources.

Hydrogen can be produced directly from primary as well as from secondary energy sources. Today's commercially applied methods based on fossil raw materials include natural gas reforming and the partial oxidation of feeds with lower quality, such as petroleum coke or other refinery residues. The gasification of coal to produce hydrogen has undergone further development in the last decade and is now also a commercially available process. Apart from this, there are other methods still at the research and development stage, particularly those based on biomass, but also biological hydrogen production.

Information

Type
Chapter
Information
The Hydrogen Economy
Opportunities and Challenges
 , pp. 277 - 308
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

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