Issue 4, 2018

Effect of pressure on the gasification of dodecane with steam and supercritical water and consequences for H2 production

Abstract

Supercritical water (SCW) is widely known to be a powerful gasifying agent, but the supercritical gasification of linear paraffins is a method whose ability to produce H2 has not been studied significantly. Herein, an analysis of the gasification of dodecane, a representative diesel compound, with steam and SCW and the ability of the method to produce H2 under different pressures is reported. In this study, the broadest pressure (1–500 bar) and temperature (550–800 °C) ranges ever studied in this field are covered. We found that a fraction of the short-chain hydrocarbons generated in the thermal cracking of dodecane are turned into polycyclic aromatic compounds and phenol, compounds that hinder gasification. These reactions become more significant as steam at atmospheric pressure is progressively compressed up to SCW at 500 bar; consequently, steam gasification is faster than supercritical gasification. A gasification mechanism that gathers all of the possible pathways is proposed. Despite the slow gasification kinetics in SCW, a pressure slightly above the critical point (250 bar) is the most efficient to produce H2. At this pressure, the long reaction times related to the high SCW density allow a significant amount of CH4 and CO to be reformed into H2; however, further compression is not recommended because gasification is significantly slowed down and H2 production decreases.

Graphical abstract: Effect of pressure on the gasification of dodecane with steam and supercritical water and consequences for H2 production

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
02 Nov 2017
Accepted
02 Jan 2018
First published
02 Jan 2018

J. Mater. Chem. A, 2018,6, 1671-1681

Effect of pressure on the gasification of dodecane with steam and supercritical water and consequences for H2 production

A. M. Sanchez-Hernandez, N. Martin-Sanchez, M. J. Sanchez-Montero, C. Izquierdo and F. Salvador, J. Mater. Chem. A, 2018, 6, 1671 DOI: 10.1039/C7TA09659C

To request permission to reproduce material from this article, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements