A thermally autonomous methanol steam reforming microreactor with porous copper foam as catalyst support for hydrogen production

Methanol steam reforming microreactors can be used for hydrogen production in industry applications. This paper presents a novel thermally autonomous methanol steam reforming microreactor that uses porous copper foam as catalyst support to enhance the performance of hydrogen production. The proposed microreactor mainly consists of a vaporizer, a catalytic combustor, and a methanol steam reformer. It uses a Pt/Al2O3 catalyst with 0.15% Pt for methanol combustion and a CuO/ZnO/Al2O3 catalyst-coated copper foam for methanol steam reforming. A numerical model was developed to study the fluid flow and heat transfer characteristics in the porous copper foam and a thin-layer of coated catalyst. Simulation results revealed that the pressure drop and velocity gradient of the microreactor increased when the weight of the catalyst increased. Experimental tests were conducted to study the effects of catalyst loading on the methanol conversion, hydrogen production, and overall efficiency of the microreactor. The results indicate that the developed microreactor can be successfully startup within 13 min and its overall efficiency is approximately 35–45%. The results obtained in this research can be used to develop a highly efficient methanol steam reforming microreactor for hydrogen production.