Direct Preparation of Hydrogen and Carbon Nanotubes by Microwave Plasma Decomposition of Methane over FeSi Activated by Biased Hydrogen Plasma.docVIP

Green and Sustainable Chemistry, 2013, 3, 19-25 /10.4236/gsc.2013.31004 Published Online February 2013 (/journal/gsc) Direct Preparation of Hydrogen and Carbon Nanotubes by Microwave Plasma Decomposition of Methane over Fe/Si Activated by Biased Hydrogen Plasma Katsuya Konno , Kaoru Onoe , Yasuyuki Takiguchi , Tatsuaki Yamaguchi 1,2 2 2 2* 1 Hitachi Automotive Systems Ltd., Automotive Systems RD Laboratory, Kawasaki, Japan Department of Life and Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Engineering, Chiba Institute of Technology, Chiba, Japan * Email: tatsuaki.yamaguchi@it-chiba.ac.jp 2 Received September 23, 2012; revised October 30, 2012; accepted November 12, 2012 ABSTRACT Methane was decomposed to hydrogen and carbon nanotubes (CNTs) by microwave plasma, using Fe/Si catalyst acti- vated by biased (?150 V) hydrogen plasma for various treatment times. Upon exposure to biased hydrogen plasma, the catalyst surface becomes lumpy within 1 min, coheres between 5 and 10 min and forms particles after 20 min. The methane conversion increased up to 93% over the treatment time of 5 min. The hydrogen yield showed as similar ten- dency as the methane conversion and kept 83% at treatment time of 5 min. The treatment time up to 1 min increased the amount of deposited carbon, and after treatment time of 5 min it dropped; then again after treatment time of 20 min, it increased to reach a maximum value of 22 g /g . Deposited carbon was found to be consisted of carbon nanotubes. It c cat grew vertically on the catalyst surface and reached a maximum length of 30.7 nm after treatment time of 10 min. Multi- ple types of CNTs were present, and the CNT diameters decreased with increasing plasma treatment time. Keywords: Hydrogen; Methane Decomposition; Carbon Nanotubes; Microwave Plasma; Methane; H Plasma 2