Journal
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HYDROGEN ENERGY
Volume 43, Issue 5, Pages 2540-2555Publisher
PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.ijhydene.2017.12.081
Keywords
Hydrogen production; Methane pyrolysis; Decarbonization; Low-CO2; Techno-economic
Categories
Funding
- Dow Centre for Sustainable Engineering Innovations at the University of Queensland, Australia
- U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences [DE-FG03-89ER14048]
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In the near-to-medium future, hydrogen production will continue to rely on reforming of widely available and relatively low-cost fossil resources. A techno-economic framework is described that compares the current best practice steam methane reforming (SMR) with potential pathways for low-CO2 hydrogen production; (i) Electrolysis coupled to sustainable renewable electricity sources; (ii) Reforming of hydrocarbons coupled with carbon capture and sequestration (CGS) and; (iii) Thermal dissociation of hydrocarbons into hydrogen and carbon (pyrolysis). For methane pyrolysis, a process based on a catalytic molten Ni-Bi alloy is described and used for comparative cost estimates. In the absence of a price on carbon, SMR has the lowest cost of hydrogen production. For low-CO2 hydrogen production, methane pyrolysis is significantly more economical than electrochemical-based processes using commercial renewable power sources. At a carbon price exceeding $21 t(-1) CO2 equivalent, pyrolysis may represent the most cost-effective means of producing low-CO2 hydrogen and competes favorably to SMR with carbon capture and sequestration. The current cost disparity between renewable and fossil-based hydrogen production suggests that if hydrogen is to fulfil an expanding role in a low CO2 future, then large-scale production of hydrogen from methane pyrolysis is the most cost-effective means during the transition period while infrastructure and end-use applications are deployed. (C) 2017 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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