7. Future perspective

on the heat recovery of the designed reformers. An oven was employed for the simulation of the heat recovery. The results specified that the oven temperature is proportional to the reforming reaction temperature and hence promote the energy of the reformer. When the energy of reformer was increased the synthesis gas production enhanced and efficiency of reforming and CO2 conversion was obviously raised. The production of hydrogen and carbon from the catalytic decomposition of methane via iron catalyst was explored [69]. The

Figure 4. Stability performances in terms of H2 yield (%) over 15Co-30Fe/Al catalysts as a function of TOS at 700C at

850 78.0

800 90

Table 3. Summary of hydrogen yield from methane for various hydrogen production techniques.

Hydrogen yield (%) References

( C)

Dry reforming 750 43.0 [71]

Steam Reforming 500 98.7 [72] Steam Reforming 750 85.0 [73] Partial Oxidation 850 88.9 [74] Partial Oxidation 750 36.8 [75] Autothermal 700 83.0 [76] Autothermal 850 78.0 [77] Decomposition 700 75 [78]

different GHSVs.

Hydrogen production techniques Temperature

54 Advances In Hydrogen Generation Technologies

Currently, about 1/5 of global energy is utilized as electricity, whereas 80% is utilized as fuel. Hydrogen energy is a clean and alternative energy that has been suggested as the energy carrier of the future. Solar-driven microalga hydrogen production is both a favorable and inspiring biotechnology, which play a significant role in the global drive to decrease GHG emissions. One of the major barriers with regard to the hydrogen economy is its production cost and inefficient storage methods, which need to be resolved. Current research efforts are focused on strain improvement by systems metabolic engineering and finding suitable conditions to increase the levels of hydrogen production. In the near future, it may be possible to perform knockouts and insertions based on the data available by modeling previous studies. The advent of synthetic biology necessitates such models since it aims at standardizing biology, which should give predicted responses. With all these advancements, the commercial feasibility of H2 production may rely on efficient production strategies with elevated yield, well-organized transport and storage systems ensuring the secured supply of hydrogen. Moreover, the prospect of light hydrocarbon hydrogen production is determined by the research advances such as enhancement of productivity through catalytic engineering and the advance of chemical reactors, the economic attentions like the price of fossil fuels, social appreciation, and use of hydrogen energy systems in our society. Today, hydrogen is being used to power a fleet of busses in some countries. More industries will accept hydrogen energy when a renewable economically viable process of hydrogen production is achieved. Last but not least, the integrated effort of both scientists and engineers is needed to fully implement hydrogen energy as the energy for the future. Mass hydrogen production is the foundation for the transition to a "hydrogen economy", which has the potential to enable the development of distributed power generation networks [79].

## 8. Conclusions

The global crisis of fossil fuels has greatly stimulated worldwide interest to develop sustainable sources of energy carriers. Light hydrocarbons can be used as a potential source of hydrogen energy due to their inherent capacity to decompose the hydrocarbon into H2 using the thermochemical energy. Photo-biological hydrogen production is considered as a more efficient and less energy-intensive process. Hydrogen powered fuels can be used in different types of fuel cells as a clean energy to generate electricity with high efficiency. At present, hydrogen energy from microalgae is economically less feasible due to its high production cost. Nevertheless, efficient bio-hydrogen production from microalgae may be accelerated by recent technological advancements in metabolic and genetic engineering approaches.

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