Hydrogen by Steam Reforming of Ethanol over Co-Mg Incorporated Novel Mesoporous Alumina Catalysts in Tubular and Microwave Reactors

摘要

Bio-ethanol is an excellent hydrogen carrier with a good potential to be used as a resource for on-board hydrogen production. In this work, a set of new Co incorporated mesoporous alumina (MA) catalysts modified with Mg were synthesized and the effects of synthesis procedure on their catalytic performances were investigated in steam reforming of ethanol. Activity tests of the synthesized catalysts were performed in a reactor with conductive heating and also in a focused-microwave system, in which better energy utilization and temperature uniformity were achieved. Product distributions obtained with Co incorporated Mg promoted mesoporous alumina catalysts synthesized by following impregnation and one-pot routes (Co@Mg-MA and Co-Mg-MA, respectively) gave very high and stable hydrogen yields, over 5.2 moles per mole of ethanol reacted. However, in the case of Co based catalyst synthesized using unmodified mesoporous alumina, hydrogen yield value was quite low and the main product was ethylene.