Introduction to Polymer Electrolyte Membrane PEM Electrolyzer

 Do you ever wonder how a hydrogen electrolyzer works? The idea is to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, using electricity. In this diagram, water is fed into the electrolyzer, after being pumped and cooled. Then, at the anode site, oxygen is produced and separated out in the Oxygen/water separator. While at the cathode side, hydrogen is produced. The high pressure hydrogen is separated out in the high pressure separator. After a pressure reduction valve, additional low pressure hydrogen is produced and the water is recycled back to the oxygen/water separator.

Use Steam Methane Reformer SMR to Produce Hydrogen

Introduction

Hydrogen is becoming a hotter and hotter topic. Do you know how hydrogen is produced? One popular method to produce hydrogen is through a steam methane reforming process.

Overview

Generally speaking, there are 6 process modules to produce hydrogen. First methane and steam react in the heating & reaction module, then it is cooled to ambient temperature before sending to a Pressure Swing Adsorption or PSA module to get the pure hydrogen. The final step is to compress hydrogen to the required pressure. Along with the 4 main process modules, we also need to have a steam module to produce steam and a flue gas module to provide all the heat needed in the process.

Methane feed is first split to 2 parts. The major part will be converted to hydrogen and the other part will be burned to provide the heat required. I will first go through the 4 main process modules and then come back to the 2 utility modules.