A thermo-environmental study of hydrogen production from the steam reforming of bioethanol

• This paper provides accurate conditions for H2 production via bioethanol reforming.
• Various assessment tools are applied to study H2 production from bioethanol.
• The base case process has low energetic and environmental performances.
• Production of bioethanol is the most influential on the environmental performance.
• A reforming temperature of 800 °C and steam to carbon ratio of 5 are recommended.

The main objective of this study is to accurately report the conditions for sustainable hydrogen production via steam reforming of bioethanol. To this end, various engineering assessment tools are simultaneously applied (energetic and exergetic analyses and life cycle assessment). The process operating parameters were also varied to illustrate the energetic, exergetic and environmental sensitivity and to provide guidance for where research and development efforts should focus for process improvement. A base-case process operating under conditions recommended by simple investigation of chemical reactions was thoroughly investigated. The results show that this base case suffers from low performance. This is because the energetic, exergetic and environmental performances are comparatively lower than similar findings previously reported by other researchers for other reformates. The parametric investigation indicates that the process performance could be improved by a proper and rational combination of the reactor temperature and the steam-to-carbon ratio. A reforming a temperature of 800 °C and a steam-to-carbon ratio of 5 are recommended as the best conditions for the conversion of bioethanol-to-hydrogen. Such conditions ensure not only the lowest consumption of energy to generate a given amount of hydrogen but also the best environmental performance of the entire system.