A process integration analysis of H2 production from gasification of biomass in the oil refining industry

Paper in proceeding, 2010

The refining industry faces a future with increasing hydrogen demand, a change in fuel mixture that increases process energy demand and at the same time a future with harder regulations on CO2 emissions. In this paper the CO2 effect of integrating different biomass gasification concepts to meet an increasing demand of hydrogen in an oil refinery are examined and presented in comparison with a conventional steam reformer. The result shows that if biomass is considered as an unlimited resource (i.e. CO2 neutral), biomass gasification concepts have a potential to reduce CO2 emissions. However, if biomass is considered as a limited resource, which is a likely future scenario, all studied concepts show an increase of CO2 emissions.