DME conversion using high flux tubular membrane reactors

Abstract

High flux tubular membrane reactors were designed for dimethyl ether (DME) steam reforming. Considering the facile scale-up and high flux of hydrogen, tubular stainless steel supports were employed for the membrane reactors. At 500 degrees C, DME conversion reached similar to 100%, while hydrogen recovery reached 20%. However, contamination by CO was rather high (>1%), making this process unsuitable for proton exchange membrane fuel cell applications, which require a CO concentration of <100 ppm. This result showed that an additional polishing step was needed to reduce the CO concentration. Membrane reactors were further modified to perform an water-gas shift reaction on the permeate of the membrane reactors by employing a fixed bed reactor, which yielded high-purity hydrogen (similar to 99%) along with a low CO content (<20 ppm).