Effect of catalytic distribution on the performance of microreactor for hydrogen production through methane steam reforming

The effect of catalyst coating distributing on the reactor performance for methane steam reforming(MSR) was numerically investigated. In calculation, the amount catalyst loaded on the microreactor wall was fixed but the catalyst active site density was distributed according to arithmetic progression along the flow direction. Results show that it is possible to get the higher conversion of CH4 and output of H-2 due to the higher availability ratio of catalyst surface active sites at this distribution. And this distribution effect is more remarkable at higher space velocity or lower reaction temperature, however, there exists an optimal distribution which can reach the highest CH4 conversion and H-2 production at 900K.