Patent ID: 7037485

Claim:
A steam methane reforming method comprising: heating a feed stream comprising olefins and hydrogen to a temperature of no greater than about 600° C.; contacting the hydrogen and the olefins within the feed stream with a catalyst capable of promoting both hydrogenation and partial oxidation reactions and catalytically reacting said hydrogen with the olefins without adding oxygen to produce an intermediate product stream containing saturated hydrocarbons formed from hydrogenation of the olefins, the heating of the feed stream being sufficient and/or the olefins being present within the feed stream at a sufficient concentration that the intermediate product stream is produced at a temperature of greater than about 400° C.; and reacting a reformer feed stream formed at least in part by the intermediate product stream and a steam stream in a steam methane reformer to obtain a synthesis gas product stream having more moles of hydrogen than that of the feed stream and also containing carbon monoxide, water and carbon dioxide; the catalytic reaction of the hydrogen and the olefins being conducted within a reactor containing the catalyst at a space velocity of greater than about 10,000 hr −1 and with a sufficient amount of hydrogen such that the reformer feed stream has an olefin content of less than about 0.5% of olefins by volume on a dry basis.