Numerical investigation of a steam methane reforming process was
performed from point of view to understand the heat flows inside a
catalyst particle. To verify the numerical results, a new method based
on the thermal conductivity equation has been developed to determine the
temperature distribution inside the catalyst particle. The CFD-model was
realized via ANSYS Fluent. To model the steam methane reforming process,
the industrial Ni-based catalyst with a spherical particle was chosen.
The temperature contours inside the catalyst particle and hydrogen mole
fraction in the reaction space was calculated both numerically and
analytically. The results show the irregularity in the distribution of
the temperature field inside the catalyst. In the direction of flow, a
minimum catalyst temperature occurs. In this case, the temperature
decrease inside the catalyst occurs unevenly. Also, the temperature
change on the catalyst surface as a function of flow time was analyzed.