Membrane development: After determining reaction conditions and purity requirements, available membrane systems and their applicability under the given conditions have been considered. The first separation concept of the WGS case had to be changed. A membrane coating technology for thin and dense layers on ceramic support material has been developed and samples for further processing have been prepared.
Immobilization of catalytic system: Support structures for membrane modules have been determined and optimized, samples and strategies for catalyst immobilization and characterization of the coated systems provided, and the catalyst system has been optimized.
Catalytic membrane systems feasibility: Reaction conditions have been determined and experimental and analytical set-up have been done. After catalyst tests on support structures, the catalyst and membrane system has been tested under near industrial conditions.
Methodology development: The model set-up has been discussed, boundary conditions determined and support for establishing a reaction and diffusion model provided. A short cut modelling has been performed and applied to a ROMEO tool box.
Reactor design: The reactor design was done in close cooperation between the partners. Besides general design aspects a scale and numbering-up concept was realized.
Demonstration: Two mini plants have been set up at different sites and operated for the two prominent reactions under industrial near conditions for more than 5000 h (HyFo) and 1500 h (water-gas-shift). A life time cycle assessment for the catalyst/membrane module with data from demonstration trials has been done.
Dissemination and business plan: A home page, several project newsletters, videos, press releases etc. have been done as well as a 2- day workshop on membrane reactor technology and 35 oral/poster presentations Eight scientific publications have been done, seven patent applications submitted and a proposal for a business plan has been elaborated.
Selected main results and their exploitation
- Monoliths coated with a dense and thin membrane layer. Exploitation for HyFo, WGS and other chemical reactions.
- 2D membrane reactor model in ACM. Exploitation for a priori design of gas phase membrane reactors.
- Shortcut membrane reactor model. Exploitation for optimization of gas phase membrane reactors.
- Insitu preparation and immobilization of catalytic system. Exploitation for Hyfo + further applications.
- Seven submitted patent applications for HyFo related processes. Exploitation for Hyfo.
- Membrane reactor design for monolithic supported ionic liquid phase catalysis. Exploitation for Gas-phase catalysis and separation processes in a laboratory scale.
- Four intended patent applications for reactor types, components and coating. Exploitation for WGS and other syngas applications, HyFo, oxydations, hydrogenations and gas phase catalysis.
- Hybrid SILP-CNT materials for catalysis. Exploitation for HyFo, WGS and catalytic processes.
An important activity to exploit the results is the successor project MACBETH (GA 869896 started on 01 Nov 2019) in order to bring the technology to higher TRLs and to broaden the application scope to further application cases.
