Review of reactor systems for hydrogen production via ammonia decomposition

Hydrogen is widely regarded as an ideal energy source, while the difficulties related to storage and transportation restricted its affordable employments. Ammonia, as a zero-carbon substance with properties of high hydrogen content, easy liquefaction and excellent safety, is recognized as a promising hydrogen carrier. In the past decades, much effort has been dedicated into the transformation from ammonia to hydrogen. Herein, this work provided some references for the future development of ammonia decomposition based hydrogen production systems under the theme of sustainable development. The ammonia decomposition technologies, including combustion/electric/solar heating, plasma, photo/electro catalysis, and the key materials including thermal/photo/electro catalysts for kinetics improvement, were presented and compared. Then, the hydrogen separation technologies including pressure swing adsorption and permeable membranes were introduced. Particularly, the recent progress of ammonia decomposition reactors and hydrogen production systems were discussed and summarized. Finally, the characteristics of diverse ammonia decomposition reactors and hydrogen production system were evaluated, followed with the recommendations and perspectives on their different application scenarios.