Precious metal catalysts supported on ceramic and metal monolithic structures for the hydrogen economy

Distributed hydrogen for the hydrogen economy will require new catalysts and processes. Existing large-scale hydrogen plants can not simply be reduced in size to meet the economic, safety, and frequent duty cycle requirements for applications for fuel cells, hydrogen fueling stations, and industrial uses such as hydrogenation reactions, gas turbine cooling, metal processing, etc ( 1, 2). Consequently, there is a need to completely reassess how hydrogen can be made for the emerging hydrogen economy. This article presents some of the technological advantages of precious metal monoliths over traditional base metal particulate catalysts for reforming hydrocarbons, such as natural gas, for the generation of distributed hydrogen.