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US 12,643,081 B2Granted
Methanation reactor and method
AssigneesEcole Polytechnique Federale De Lausanne (Epfl), Gaznat SA
InventorsAndreas Züttel, Noris Gallandat
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Abstract
The present relates to a chemical reactor comprising a catalyst bed enclosed in a reactor vessel and at least one cooling tube placed in the reactor vessel and passing through the catalyst bed, characterized in that the cooling tubes are disposed within the reactor so as to generate thermal gradients of at least 20° C./cm thereby generating hot spots throughout the reactor upon carrying out a reaction. The invention further relates to a methanation process.
Claims16
A method of production of methane from hydrogen and carbon dioxide comprising the steps of:
- a) providing a chemical reactor comprising a reaction chamber which comprises a gas loading zone and a catalyzed reaction zone comprising a catalyst bed;
- b) loading a reaction gas mixture of hydrogen and carbon dioxide in the gas loading zone of the reaction chamber, such that the gas pressure in the reaction chamber is between 1 and 20 bar;
- c) heating the catalyst bed at a temperature between about 220 and about 260° C. such that the Sabatier reaction and a gas flow through the catalyst bed starts;
- d) creating temperature gradients of at least 20° C./cm within the catalyst bed by cooling the catalyst bed with a cooling system directly integrated in said catalyst bed;
- and
- e) collecting the resulting gas mixture flowing through the catalyst bed.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.