The company plans to use the Linde Pilot Reformer facility to further advance steam reforming technology for the production of synthesis gas, which a mixture of hydrogen (H2) and carbon monoxide (CO).
The carbon feedstock can be in the form of natural gas, liquid petroleum gas (LPG), naphtha or even carbon dioxide (CO2), for the synthesis gas, which can be used to produce downstream products such as base chemicals or fuels.
Linde Executive Board Member Dr Christian Bruch said: "Linde intends to use this pilot facility to test and optimize all kinds of approaches to reforming."
The company expects that the results drawn from the facility will help further enhance reforming processes and concepts.
Linde is currently undertaking tests in the pilot reformer with focus on the dry reforming of natural gas to produce synthesis gas.
The pilot project is backed by the German Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi).
For the process development, Linde partnered with BASF and hte which provided catalyst development; Karlsruhe Institute of Technology for simulations and DECHEMA for the supply of materials.
Expected to be more energy efficient than the conventional reforming method, the dry reforming process is expected to offer cost efficiencies when compared with the conventional method which produce CO-rich synthesis gases.
The dry reforming project is planned to be completed in 2017. If successfully, the company plans to build a reference plant of dry reforming project for its customer.
Image: The Linde Pilot Reformer research facility at Pullach near Munich. Photo: courtesy of The Linde Group.
