The decomposition of H2SO4 to produce SO2 is the reaction with the highest energy demand in the sulfur-iodine cycle and it shows a large kinetic barrier. In the present study, alumina supported iron (III) oxide has been chosen for a detailed kinetic study. Experiments were carried out in the temperature range of 1023 K-1173 K using space hour velocities in the range of 0.146-0.731 kmoVkg-h in a quartz tube double stage continuous flow fixed bed reactor with 98% sulfuric acid feed over alumina supported Fe2O3 catalyst, nitrogen as inert carrier gas. From the homogeneous kinetic analysis, the apparent activation energy (EA) was found to be 138.6 kJ/mol. This high activation energy indicates that the experiments were conducted in a kinetic controlled regime. The catalyst was well characterized by XRD, BET, TPR/TPO, SEM and FT-IR before and after reaction. Copyright (C) 2011, Hydrogen Energy Publications, LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.