Malaysia is currently the world's l

Malaysia is currently the world's largest producer and exporter of palm oil. Besides producing palm oil, at present there is an increasing interest concerning oil palm renewable energy, and one of major attentions is the production of hydrogen from biomass by catalytic routes.

There are various thermo-chemical conversion technologies which can be applied for hydrogen production from biomass. Gasification technology provides a competitive way to convert solid biomass like oil palm waste to a uniform gas mixture namely hydrogen, carbon monoxide, methane and carbon dioxide. Catalysts are widely used for syngas cleaning and play an important role in enhancing the production of hydrogen by gasification process. Various catalytic systems have been studied to improve hydrogen production and reduce tar content in syngas produced from biomass. Calcined dolomite can be an effective catalyst for minimizing tar in the product gas. Dolomite activity can be directly related to the CaO content, Fe2O3 content, pore size and distribution. A major problem with using dolomite is the deactivation due to carbon deposition and it is a soft and fragile material; however, dolomite is cheap and can be easily replaced.

A significant amount of work has been published on the area of hot gas cleaning from biomass gasification using nickel catalysts. Nickel-based supported catalysts are highly effective at the removal of tar and adjustment of the gas composition to syngas quality. The additional of nickel to dolomite and olivine could significantly improve the activity towards tar conversion.