However, autothermal reforming requires the
design of a careful control system to balance exothermic and
endothermic processes during changes in the flow rate, as well as
during start-up [5], thus, the control system is very delicate.
Steam reforming is therefore the most common and economical
method for hydrogen production because of the high hydrogen
yield [1,3]. However, this reaction is performed in a catalystpacked vessel and shows limitations that include containing the complicated system from heat supply and maintaining temperature, catalyst agglomeration from the high temperature, reduced
catalyst performance from carbon deposition, and the incase of
non-precious metal catalysts. In particular, carbon deposition on
the catalyst surface requires an added reduction process for its
removal. Furthermore, a noble metal as the catalyst is expensive
and is susceptible to contaminants such as sulfur [1,3,5,7]. In order
to overcome these limitations, we have investigated steam plasma
reforming without a catalyst