Steam Reforming of Glycerol to Produce Hydrogen Gas

Abstract

In 21st century shortage of energy reservoirs: petroleum products had seen. To overcome from this problem researcher’s tend towards production of newly renewable energy resources. Biodiesel can be one attractive solution produced from transesterification vegetable oil. Production of 100 kg biodiesel generates 10 kg of glycerol as waste which is not benign or hazardous to environment. Considering environmental impact it’s necessary to convert into useful product. Production of clean energy: hydrogen is most striking way because its carbon free leads to no environmental impact. The catalytic performance of nickel and cobalt catalyst loaded on γ-Al2O3, La2O3, ZrO2, TiO2 was tested for production of hydrogen from glycerol steam reforming in fixed bed catalytic reactor. The reactor is made up of Iconell-25 which can handle 1000°C temperature. All the experiments done in range of 550°C to 850°C at atmospheric pressure. The highest yield of hydrogen and conversion of glycerol was obtained at 850°C with weight hourly space velocity (WHSV) 2.97h-1 and ratio of glycerol to water was set to 1:9. For characterization of catalyst X-ray Diffraction, BET, Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) was used.