In the current study, a theoretical analysis of the behavior of the reaction of partial oxidation of methane performed in a palladium membrane reactor, operating under periodic conditions was carried out. The periodic operations in the pd-membrane reactor are supposed to be created by forcing some inputs cyclically using a sinusoidal function. The concerned inputs are the composition and mainly the steam and oxygen in the reactor inlet and the sweeping gas in the permeation side. It was found that the periodic operations applied to these inputs are beneficial since the predicted performance is improved. When the steam to methane ratio and the sweeping gas are running periodically both in phase, the conversion of methane and the pure hydrogen recovery can exceed the steady state levels and the H2/CO ratio is significantly reduced compared to the steady state operation.
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