Production of hydrogen from hydrogen sulfide in presence of methane

Acid gases produced from all natural gas wells must be treated prior to their use and discharge to mitigate the environmental impact. This is an active area of research as it directly affects the air quality and acid rain issues. Production of clean hydrogen fuel via reformation of hydrogen sulfide in the presence of methane offers promising route for enhanced hydrogen production from hydrogen sulfide destruction. Experimental results from a laboratory-scale reactor are presented on the amounts of hydrogen produced from a mixture of hydrogen sulfide and methane diluted in nitrogen at temperatures of 1273–1673 K. These results provide fundamental information on this novel treatment method and its aptness for clean hydrogen production. Numerical simulations, supporting the experimental conditions, assisted to determine the main reaction pathways to unravel the chemistry. Both experimental and simulation results showed the potential of more than 95% hydrogen recovery from the mixture of hydrogen sulfide and methane from the destruction of hydrogen sulfide. The role of temperature on the amounts of hydrogen produced and the residence time required to reach asymptotic steady state value has been depicted. The results provide novel transformation method of H₂S gas to clean hydrogen energy as an alternative to that used in current industry.