Chapter 12: Membrane Reactors in Hydrogen Production

In this chapter, the potentialities of membrane reactors (MRs) in hydrogen production are investigated considering the main industrial processes such as methane steam reforming, water gas shift, CO clean up, etc. The advantages offered by MRs in terms of higher conversion, higher hydrogen recovery, less catalyst amount required and less reaction/separation unit are analysed and compared to the conventional processes. In particular, the water gas shift reaction carried out in a Pd-Ag MR has been chosen as a case study to show some of the main positive aspects offered by MR technology in a real application.