A comparative study on steam and oxidative steam reforming of methane with noble metal catalysts

Methane steam reforming and oxidative steam reforming are two important processes for hydrogen generation. Steam reforming is endothermic while oxidative steam reforming has the advantage of an additional exothermic reaction therefore requiring less energy input. In this work Pt, Ru and Rh based catalysts were prepared, characterized and tested comparatively for steam reforming and oxidative steam reforming respectively. The best catalysts from both processes were compared in terms of catalytic performance. It was observed that Rh catalyst for steam reforming performs better than Ru catalyst for oxidative steam reforming as it gave higher methane conversion at low temperature and high CO2 selectivity.