Enhancing H₂ production from plasma-assisted methanol steam reforming by catalyst engineering in a MXene membrane reactor

Electrified methanol steam reforming (MSR) assisted by nonthermal plasma (NTP) is a pivotal enabler for clean hydrogen production at ambient conditions with several advantages. This study optimizes the NTP-assisted MSR by catalyst engineering, as well as membrane technology (via a 2D MXene nanosheet membrane reactor). Our findings reveal that active-phase engineering in catalyst design is crucial in regulating MSR pathways under NTP conditions with the bimetallic Ni–Cu alloys enhancing the H₂ production via surface water–gas shift reaction (WGSR). Additionally, integrating a MXene membrane within a dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) NTP reactor enabled the reactive-separation process, improving methanol conversion, H₂ formation rate with higher purity, as well as showing a good stability.