In this article, Ketruixing, who specializes in hydrogen production units in Chengdu, will give you a brief introduction to common hydrogen production methods in Chengdu.

1、 Hydrogen production from light hydrocarbon cracking

Hydrogen production from light hydrocarbon cracking mainly includes propane dehydrogenation (PDH) and ethane cracking.

The ethane cracking ethylene plants are mainly concentrated in North America, the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Since 2017, Chinese enterprises have made efforts in the ethane ethylene market, and many enterprises have announced that they will introduce low-cost light hydrocarbon raw materials from the United States to produce ethylene. The domestic ethane cracking project is accelerating its implementation. According to incomplete statistics, by the end of 2022, the domestic ethylene production capacity will reach 8.58 million tons, and the by-product hydrogen will be 553400 tons (64.5kg hydrogen will be produced by one ton of ethylene). Theoretically, 2.2 million fuel cell vehicles can be supplied.

The hydrogen produced by the PDH unit is of high purity, with little purification difficulty. Most of the production capacity is close to the eastern coastal areas, closely fitting with the downstream fuel cell application market, and has broad prospects. As of the end of June 2019, 10 PDH projects have been put into production in China, and another 4 are under construction. There are also several PDH projects in the early stage, including 4 projects planned for the exact year of production. It is estimated that by the end of 2023, the total propylene production capacity of 18 domestic PDH projects will reach 10.35 million tons/year, and the by-product hydrogen will be 390000 tons/year, theoretically, 1.56 million fuel cell vehicles can be supplied.

2、 Hydrogen production by electrolysis of water

Hydrogen production by water electrolysis has the advantages of simple process, no pollution and high purity of hydrogen products. Its disadvantages are high cost, large power consumption and no possibility of large-scale promotion and application. Hydrogen production by electrolysis of water is a reaction in which hydrogen is separated by a reduction reaction on the cathode and oxygen is separated by an oxidation reaction on the anode. The process is simple, fully automatic and easy to operate. The purity of its hydrogen products is also very high, which can generally reach the level of 99% to 99. 9%, and the main impurities are H ∈ O and O ∈, especially suitable for proton membrane fuel cells with extremely strict requirements on the content of impurities such as CO.

On the cost side, it generally requires 4-5kWh of electricity and 1L of pure water to produce 1 standard cubic meter of H ∈. The price of water is cheap, and the consumption of electricity accounts for a large proportion. The use of clean electricity to produce hydrogen is conducive to promoting the digestion of new energy waste power, and can also significantly reduce the cost of hydrogen production. China is rich in renewable energy. The development of renewable energy is in the forefront, and the new energy and cumulative installed capacity rank in the top. However, the power generation capacity of new energy power fluctuates greatly due to seasonal and climatic influences, which cannot meet the stability of the load on the power side, so the phenomenon of wind, light and water abandonment is very serious. In 2018, the national average wind abandonment rate was 7%, the light abandonment rate was 3%, and the water abandonment rate was 5%. The wind abandonment rate in areas with high wind abandonment rate was 23%, and the light abandonment rate in areas with serious light abandonment was 16%. The consumption of clean electricity is serious. We believe that the development of water electrolysis to produce hydrogen according to local conditions has broad prospects and is expected to become a solution to absorb clean electricity in areas where electricity is severely discarded. In 2018, about 100 billion kilowatt hours of electricity will be discarded from renewable energy in China. If all of it is used for hydrogen production by electrolyzing water, it can theoretically be converted into 1.8 million tons of hydrogen.

To begin with, we are limited in space. Ketruixing is mainly engaged in the production and manufacturing of Chengdu hydrogen production units and Chengdu hydrogen purification technology. If you want to know more about this, please call new and old customers for details