The obtaining of high purity hydrogen from the coal gasification process is a series of chemical reactions, several of which require reactant preparation/purification. At any point in the process, it would be useful to have a chemical separation system which can purify the product hydrogen and store it in convenient form. The purpose of this research program is to evaluate one such candidate system, the catalytically reversible hydrogenation of an aromatic hydrocarbon, toluene, to its corresponding cyclical paraffin, methylcyclohexane. Reversible hydrogenation, kinetics, and dehydrogenation is discussed. 5 refs., 4 figs.