Microchannel chemical reactors for fuel processing applications. II. Compact fuel vaporization

A fuel processor is a critical element for the deployment of automotive fuel cell power systems. One component of the fuel processor, the compact gasoline vaporizer, was demonstrated at full-scale using commercial-grade gasoline. The full-scale process volume was less than 0.3 liters; it vaporized nearly 300 mL/min of gasoline, which is sufficient to support a 50-kW(e) fuel cell. The reduction in hardware volume was made possible using a microchannel reactor-based design; the compact process hardware is roughly an order of magnitude smaller than conventional technology.