Numerical simulation of glycerol steam reforming in Fixed bed silica membrane reactor

In this study, the catalytic glycerol steam reformin to hydrogen production was investigated in a tubular silica membrane reactor (MR) in presence of a commercial Co-Ni/Al2O3 catalyst. To this purpose, a 2D-axisymmetric, isothermal model based on computational fluid dynamic (CFD) method is presented to investigate the silica MR performance during glycerol steam reforming process for hydrogen production. The proposed CFD model provides the local information of velocity, pressure and component concentration for the driving force analysis. The validation of model results was carried out by experimental data and a good agreement between model results and experimental data was achieved. It was found that the efficient removal of hydrogen in the silica MR could significantly increase the glycerol conversion. Moreover, using CFD simulation runs, effects of operating parameters such as reaction temperature and reaction pressure values on the silica MR performance was evaluated in terms of glycerol conversion and COx-free hydrogen recovery. It can be concluded that the glycerol conversion realized in silica MR is higher than traditional reactor (TR) during glycerol steam reforming reaction, in all the studiedcases.

کلیدواژه ها:

silica membrane reactor ، glycerol steam reforming(GSR) ، CFD ، hydrogen production ، fixed bed reactor(FBR)