HYDROGEN MANUFACTURING APPARATUS, SYSTEM FOR GENERATING ELECTRICITY BY USING THE SAME, AND METHOD FOR OPERATING THE SAME

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a hydrogen manufacturing apparatus in which a plurality of reforming reactors are operated in combination with one another and the temperature of each of the reforming reactors in operation is kept optimum whether the amount of hydrogen to be manufactured is large or small. SOLUTION: In a low-load operation mode of manufacturing a small amount of hydrogen, hydrogen is manufactured mainly in a group A of the reforming reactors and weak partial oxidation reaction is performed in a group B of the reforming reactors of stand-by states to restrain the temperature of the whole reforming system from being lowered. In a high-load operation mode of manufacturing a large amount of hydrogen, the manufacture of hydrogen is started by using the groups A and B at the same time and the ratio of exothermic reaction (partial oxidation reaction) is the group A is made low to restrain the excessive rise of the temperature. As mentioned above, a plurality of groups of the mutually heat-transferable reforming reactors are combined with one another, the amount of raw fuel to be supplied for specifying the ratio of the exothermic reaction in each group according to the requested amount of hydrogen to be manufactured can be controlled to be changed over. COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO