Natural Gas Conversion Using Proton-Conducting Ceramic Membrane Reactor

While the natural gas constitutes a large fraction of fossil hydrocarbon sources, upgrading it to value-added chemical intermediates is crucial for modern chemical industry. While multi-stage industrial indirect conversion via synthesis gas to chemical intermediates dominates the major process, however, the high capital cost still pushes the demand of investing direct conversion path which potentially could reduce the overall cost. Non-oxidative conversion of natural gas to aromatics is a promising chemical process that can synthesize aromatics and hydrogen for downstream conversion processes, which increases process efficiency significantly by improving selectivity and avoiding separation process. In this work, a proton-conducting ceramic catalytic membrane reactor with embedded innovative catalysts is studied for natural gas conversion with higher performance by applying electrochemical potential to overcome the thermodynamic reaction equilibrium. The catalyst candidates are developed to facilitate the high conversion and selectivity towards benzene and other useful olefins with enhanced stability against coking problem. The integration of catalyst into the CMR is also initiated to evaluate the role of hydrogen extraction on improving the aromatics and olefin yielding. The proof of concept is demonstrated to emphasize the great potential of utilizing the renewable electrons into value-added chemicals synthesis.