Plasma processing methods for hydrogen production

In the future a transfer from the fossil fuel-based economy to hydrogen-based economy is expected. Therefore the development of systems for efficient H2 production becomes important. The several conventional methods of mass-scale (or central) H2 production (methane, natural gas and higher hydrocarbons reforming, coal gasification reforming) are well developed and their costs of H2 production are acceptable. However, due to the H2 transport and storage problems the small-scale (distributed) technologies for H2 production are demanded. However, these new technologies have to meet the requirement of producing H2 at a production cost of $(1–2)/kg(H2) (or 60 g(H2)/kWh) by 2020 (the U.S. Department of Energy’s target). Recently several plasma methods have been proposed for the small-scale H2 production. The most promising plasmas for this purpose seems to be those generated by gliding, plasmatron and nozzle arcs, and microwave discharges. In this paper plasma methods proposed for H2 production are briefly described and critically evaluated from the view point of H2 production efficiency. The paper is aiming at answering a question if any plasma method for the small-scale H2 production approaches such challenges as the production energy yield of 60 g(H2)/kWh, high production rate, high reliability and low investment cost.