Hydrogen Production from Cellulose via Spark Dielectric Barrier Discharge Plasma

The processing of biomass feedstock, particularly agricultural, paper, and cardboard waste, using renewable electricity can lead to the sustainable production of green hydrogen. Low-temperature atmospheric pressure plasma (LTAPP) sources can lead to hydrogen production approaches with higher efficiency and selectivity than thermo-chemical methods
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. A LTAPP reactor based on spark Dielectric-Barrier Discharge (SDBD) based on a pin-to-plate discharge configuration is used to investigate the production of hydrogen from cellulose as a biomass feedstock model. The SDBD plasma is characterized using an electrical model to estimate the power consumed by the plasma, together with spectroscopic diagnostics to determine representative excitation and electron temperatures, and electron number density. Gas products are determined using gas chromatography. Experimental results show that the hydrogen production rate reaches a maximum at 3 minutes of operation and then monotonically decreases with treatment time. This behavior is attributed to the competition between devolatilization and charring reactions. The minimum energy cost of production attained is 600 kWh/kg of H
2
, whereas the maximum hydrogen yield is 4.0 mmol of H2 per gram of cellulose, and the maximum hydrogen selectivity is 88%. Overall, the results depict SDBD plasma as an effective means for the valorization of cellulose.