Plasma processing methods for hydrogen production

In the future a transfer from the fossil fuel-based economy to hydrogen-based economy is expected. Therefore the development of systems for efficient H-2 production becomes important. The several conventional methods of mass-scale (or central) H-2 production (methane, natural gas and higher hydrocarbons reforming, coal gasification reforming) are well developed and their costs of H-2 production are acceptable. However, due to the H-2 transport and storage problems the small-scale (distributed) technologies for H-2 production are demanded. However, these new technologies have to meet the requirement of producing H-2 at a production cost of $(1-2)/kg(H-2) (or 60 g(H-2)/kWh) by 2020 (the U.S. Department of Energy's target). Recently several plasma methods have been proposed for the small-scale H-2 production. The most promising plasmas for this purpose seems to be those generated by gliding, plasmatron and nozzle arcs, and microwave discharges. In this paper plasma methods proposed for H-2 production are briefly described and critically evaluated from the view point of H-2 production efficiency. The paper is aiming at answering a question if any plasma method for the small-scale H-2 production approaches such challenges as the production energy yield of 60 g(H-2)/kWh, high production rate, high reliability and low investment cost.