Syngas in perspective

Syngas manufacture is an important part of a Fischer-Tropsch (FT) plant as it is responsible for ca. 60% of the investments. The developments of syngas technologies are summarized in Section 1. The present choice for large-scale FT plants based on natural gas is autothermal reforming. The requirements to the syngas and the state of art are summarized. The main costs of an ATR unit are related to the manufacture of oxygen. Air-blown technologies are discussed and compared with ATR. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.