Increase hydrogen production

This paper reports that increases in hydrogen demand by many industries have resulted in the construction of new plants, which are often of small capacity. Hydrogen production may be increased by revamping an existing plant. Several revamp options are available depending upon the required capacity increase. A capacity increase can be obtained by making use of the design margins of equipment and carrying out some minor debottlenecking such that the plant may be operated at maximum capacity. Depending on the previous design, this generally permits a capacity increase between 3% and 10%. However, larger capacity increases require more capital-intensive revamping. A base case study of an existing hydrogen plant considered the revamp work required to achieve capacity increases. In each case the various cost and utilities consumption were estimated