Process Industries 2

2Hydrogen Production by Steam Reforming

Chapter written by Marie BASIN, Diana TUDORACHE, Matthieu FLIN, Raphaël FAURE and Philippe ARPENTINIER.

2.1. The industrial production of hydrogen

2.1.1. The processes of hydrogen production

2.1.1.1. History

In 1868, two French scientists – Tessié du Motay and Maréchal – were the first to describe a process for converting hydrocarbons into hydrogen in the presence of water. However, hydrocarbon steam reforming did not generate industrial interest in hydrogen production until 1924, when Neumann and Jacob published the first detailed study of the catalytic reaction between methane and steam. Many patents were registered in the years that followed and the first industrial steam reformer was used in 1931 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana (USA) by the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, now Exxon. Further implementations followed rapidly, mainly in England and Germany. It was not until 1946 that the first French reformer was used in Toulouse by the ONIA (Office National Industriel de l’Azote). Over the following decade, developments in metallurgy enabled the implementation of pressurized steam reforming, thus improving the energy efficiency of the process through better heat recovery and lower compression costs in ammonia and methanol production units. In the 1960s, the reforming of heavier hydrocarbons, such as naphtha, was developed (Rostrup-Nielsen 1983). Today, hydrogen production by steam reforming is a mature process. Hydrogen is mainly produced ...