A micro-structured 5 kW complete fuel processor for iso-octane as hydrogen supply system for mobile auxiliary power units Part I. Development of autothermal reforming catalyst and reactor

Development of the catalyst coating for the octane reformer reactor, the design of the reactor and single reactor tests at final scale was described. A micro-structured autothermal reformer was developed for a fuel processing/fuel cell system running on iso-octane and designed for an electrical power output of 5 kW sub(el). Most of the pre-heating of the reactor was performed applying a mixture of nitrogen and steam as heat carrier, which was fed directly into the reaction channels. The steam to carbon ratio (S/C) of the feed was continuously decreased from 5.1 to 3.3 by increasing the iso-octane and oxygen feed rate while keeping the nitrogen and steam flow rate constant.