Novel Ceramic Membranes for Efficient Hydrogen Recovery

The conversion of carbon-containing feedstocks to hydrogen and syngas will play important roles in the 21st century in the form of large plants for converting natural gas to liquids, hydrocarbons to chemicals, biomass to fuels and chemicals, and small units for powering fuel cells. Advancements in hydrogen membrane separation technologies have the potential to reduce costs, improve efficiency, and simplify hydrogen production systems. Technology Assessment & Transfer, Inc. (TA&T), in collaboration with Virginia Tech, propose an innovative fabrication process for optimizing a breakthrough graded ceramic membrane for hydrogen separation. TA&T will utilize their ceramic stereolithography (CSL) fabrication process, which has unparalleled geometric flexibility, to create complex porous alumina membrane support structures. Virginia Tech will adjust ceramic membrane fabrication techniques to apply their ceramic membranes to the monolithic support modules provided by TA&T. The merging of these two enabling technologies will increase separation efficiency with H2 flux increase that results from the complex, turbulence-generating geometries in these compact, monolithic support modules. Commercial Applications and Other Benefits: Increase in hydrogen separation efficiency would allow the U.S. to reduce their dependence on foreign oil and instead utilize a domestic coal supply. The clean production of hydrogen from coal and the increasing use of hydrogen as an alternative to gasoline and other carbon emitters will have a positive effect on global warming and air quality. These membranes, since they are ceramic, will eliminate U.S. dependence on foreign suppliers of platinum group metals for H2 separation membranes.