The coal/CaO/steam gasification system is one of the clean coal technologies being developed for hydrogen production with inherent carbon dioxide separation. A novel reactor configuration for the system is proposed in this paper. It consists of three major counterparts: a gasifier, a riser and a regenerator. A regenerable calcium-based sorbent CaO is used to remove carbon dioxide. In the gasifier, the coal-steam gasification reaction occurs with in situ carbon dioxide removal by carbonation reaction. The removal of carbon dioxide favors the gasification and water-shift reaction equilibrium and enables the production of a hydrogen-rich gas stream. CaO is regenerated in the regenerator by burning the unreacted char with oxygen, and a pure stream of carbon dioxide is separated after a cyclone. The regenerated CaO then flows into the riser above the gasifier, and removes the carbon dioxide in the outlet gases from the gasifier and drives the water-gas shift reaction forward, further improving the hydrogen purity. In this work, the feasibility and optimum process conditions of the proposed system were described. The hydrogen purity can reach 96 vol% at a steam flow 80 mol/s and CaO recycle rate 30 molls when the carbon conversion rate is 0.50. Increasing the steam flow and CaO recycle rate can enhance the hydrogen yield and purity. With the rise of operation pressure from 1 bar to 10 bar, the hydrogen yield and purity decrease and methane yield increases. High pressure leads to higher calcination temperature. At 10 bar, the temperature for CaCO3 decomposition is approximately 1100 degrees C, at such temperature, the sorbent is easy to deactivate. The appropriate temperatures in the gasifier and the riser are 700 and 600 degrees C, respectively. An analysis of heat integration is conducted. The maximum carbon conversion rate is similar to 0.65. A hydrogen production efficiency of 58.5% is obtained at a carbon conversion rate 0.50, steam flow 60 molls and CaO recycle rate 30 mol/s, with a hydrogen purity of 93.7 vol%. Crown Copyright (C) 2011, Hydrogen Energy Publications, LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.