Public Release: 29-Nov-2018
New catalyst produces cheap hydrogen
Queensland University of Technology
Professor Anthony O’Mullane said the potential for the chemical storage of renewable energy in the form of hydrogen was being investigated around the world.
“The Australian Government is interested in developing a hydrogen export industry to export our abundant renewable energy,” said Professor O’Mullane from QUT’s Science and Engineering Faculty.
“In principle, hydrogen offers a way to store clean energy at a scale that is required to make the rollout of large-scale solar and wind farms as well as the export of green energy viable.
“However, current methods that use carbon sources to produce hydrogen emit carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that mitigates the benefits of using renewable energy from the sun and wind.
“Electrochemical water splitting driven by electricity sourced from renewable energy technology has been identified as one of the most sustainable methods of producing high-purity hydrogen.”
Professor O’Mullane said the new composite material he and PhD student Ummul Sultana had developed enabled electrochemical water splitting into hydrogen and oxygen using cheap and readily available elements as catalysts.
“Traditionally, catalysts for splitting water involve expensive precious metals such as iridium oxide, ruthenium oxide and platinum,” he said.
“An additional problem has been stability, especially for the oxygen evolution part of the process.
“What we have found is that we can use two earth-abundant cheaper alternatives – cobalt and nickel oxide with only a fraction of gold nanoparticles – to create a stable bi-functional catalyst to split water and produce hydrogen without emissions.
“From an industry point of view, it makes a lot of sense to use one catalyst material instead of two different catalysts to produce hydrogen from water.”
Professor O’Mullane said the stored hydrogen could then be used in fuel cells.
“Fuel cells are a mature technology, already being rolled out in many makes of vehicle. They use hydrogen and oxygen as fuels to generate electricity – essentially the opposite of water splitting.
“With a lot of cheaply ‘made’ hydrogen we can feed fuel cell-generated electricity back into the grid when required during peak demand or power our transportation system and the only thing emitted is water.”
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“Gold Doping in a Layered Co-Ni Hydroxide System via Galvanic Replacement for Overall Electrochemical” was published in Advanced Functional Materials.
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From Forbes with the CO2 misinformation deleted:
https://goo.gl/551AYp
Hydrogen from steam reformation of methane.
Pros
Net positive source of energy.
No negative emissions at end point of use.
Less expensive than hydrogen from electrolysis.
Cons
It’s energy inefficient compared to burning the methane in a combined cycle gas generator to get much more of the energy.
Nitrous and sulfur oxides are emitted by processing and create air pollution.
Hydrogen from electrolysis
Pros
No negative emissions at end point of use.
No Nitrous and sulfur oxides are emitted
Cons
Electrolysis is about 70% efficient, meaning about 30% of the energy in the electricity is wasted. This is much less efficient than batteries.
Fuel cells are only 40% to 60% efficient and waste heat is generated. If the waste heat is used as well, overall efficiency at point of generation can be greater, but the theoretical maximum is 85%. At minimum, 15% of stored electricity is thrown away. In reality, no automotive fuel cell captures the waste heat, so 40% to 60% of the stored electricity is thrown away.
If the hydrogen is burned in a Carnot or steam cycle, then efficiency is even lower than via a fuel cell, closer to gasoline where efficiency is in the range of 20%.
A quick search reveled some active projects:
Ohio system: https://goo.gl/YLgmR6
Kenworth: https://goo.gl/yVmGdX
Just what the greens desire – water as a major transportation fuel. Be careful what you wish for as H2O vapor (which would come out out the millions of tailpipes) is the major greenhouse gas for Earth with 90% by volume., which may gives us real global warming. It could also cause more clouds and storms which can give us more extreme weather that could make a switch back to fossil fuels to return to today’s base level of extreme weather.
you will never guess what comes out of the tailpipe ,that is connected to burning fossil fuels..
water ,from the hydrogen in fossil fuels…(including coal)
Remember what “catalyst” means. This invention doesn’t produce hydrogen without input energy, it just reduces the price of the machine that converts electrical energy into hydrogen; and the price of that machine is not what’s holding back the hydrogen economy. Hydrogen is much more difficult to store than gasoline, and brings a bigger risk of explosions.
g
Before anyone gets too passionate about hydrogen, let me suggest that they read my post entitled “Drilling For Hydrogen” … the devil is in the details.
w.
I have been looking (Goggling) the current state of use for Hydrogen, seems I was out of touch:
From 2012 https://goo.gl/UWSMCj and now https://goo.gl/v1TpDd with the latest news https://goo.gl/aLTjyy along with Kenworth https://goo.gl/MTrWcn and Cummins https://goo.gl/ByQ6Vk both producing engines and vehicles. It seems that using batteries that are charged by hydrogen fuel cells (HFC) is becoming a reality. Germany has a train based on HFC https://goo.gl/8RQdEL
Is it cost effective ? I doubt it, I can’t imagine a train with enough LiPO batteries and HFC storage hauling freight across the country being cost effective or even close to a factor of 1,000 but who knows, a lot of people are trying like Costa Rica and Cummins .
In particular, look at Figure 2 in that post. “Energy density of selected materials”
The winner is diesel, unless we figure out a good way to burn aluminum. The surprise loser is lithium ion battery.
Imagine an industrial process in full scale, to produce a very dangerous substance, powered by unreliable and intermittent sources.
No, it is not a possible solution from an engineering point of view, unless there are back-up power sources, such as diesel generators.
PS: this topic was discussed some 4 years ago, here.
Biology has already invented all the cheap ways to produce reduced hydrogen, and thus the electrons from its subsequent oxidation.
Everything else is just a bad copy.
Pure Hydrogen is a pain in the azz… Yer better off when it is bonded to Carbon atoms…. 😉
Pure Hydrogen is a proverbial pain… Yer better off when it is bonded to Carbon atoms…. 😉
Wait a minute, this will never be allowed. Is H2O not a green house gas many time more potent than CO2. Beside cheap energy for our cars cannot be a good thing either.
Do these engineers know a gallon of gasoline has 4 (four!) times the energy of a gallon of liquid hydrgen? You aint shipping this stuff anywhere! Do these engineers know that you are selling your hydrogen energy (having to make it with 60% effiiciency for a true cost of at least a buck fifty a kilowatt before transshipment and distribution? Do you know whose paying for this wonderful export opportunity? An already impoverished overtaxed poor citizenry. Shame on you.
Plus 100!
Sounds like ANOTHER wait and see boondoggle. Riding around sitting on oxygen and hydrogen liquids (Think NASA and rocket science) is like riding on TNT or C4. LNG/butane is much safer and readily available, my Father’s old 1948 Ford Pickup truck used butane. He drove it until he died in 1975. A collector paid 10 grand for it.
Is there a possible use of heavier Silanes in combustion engines?
Hang the H on a backbone of carbon and sell the liquid through existing distribution infrstructure.
LZ 129 Hindenburg is an iconic example of a hydrogen powered vehicle. Its photo is an apt image for this article
Hydrogen is just an “energy carrier” a bit like an electron. We actually found a safe way to store it, move it around and use it a long time ago. It’s called hydrocarbons.
As per others above, the energy required to split the H2O bonds has not changed, cannot be changed and never will be changed.
Fuel cells? Ask the Ballard investors what they think about the commercial viability of fuel cells.
Every ten year or so some money grubbing third rate professor re-invents this hysteria which the forever ignorant media then promulgate. This is the fifth time I have seen it started.
Well said.
The only catalyst that will matter is the one that sends hydrogen up the lumen of the porous pipe and oxygen outside the pipe to recombine with the OH radicals of disassociation.
I thought that the amount of energy in the world / universe is constant / fixed, except for conversion to heat, waste, leakage and massive unexplained unrecoverable losses, e.g., in Washington D.C.
The entire proposal sounds (again) like on of those “free HHO energy from magnetic motor” ads where you can purchase the plans and training video on internet and pay by Western Union or I-Tune cards.
Sci-Hub.tw cracked the paywall
https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.201804361
Up until the mid 1950’s much of NYC’s fuel of choice was coal gas. It was the product of “cracked” coal and was made of hydrogen and carbon monoxide. It was handled and distributed successfully from the mid 1800’s until the natural gas pipelines reached the Northeast and the last plant in Terrytown closed.
The coal gas pipes did become infused, but not weakened. They were almost impossible to cut and pounding them with a hammer did nothing. The place I lived in Manhattan had been originally lit and heated by coal gas (Town Gas). The old pipes were the most indestructible pipes I’ve ever seen.
Town gas is more dangerous than hydrogen alone due to CO poisoning.
Statements that prove the alleged researchers did not really study the problem, materials and solutions involved.
Which damages any credibility these characters were depending upon.
A) “Fuel cells are a mature technology“; no! fuel cells are not a mature technology!
B) “With a lot of cheaply ‘made’ hydrogen“; extremely doubtful!!
As the claim is made, it appears to be more press release smoke an mirrors.
Cheaper than gasoline?
Cheaper than acetylene?
Cheaper than methane?
Cheaper than coal?
Cheaper than unaltered water and calcium carbide?
C) Then there are the problems about how to obtain power back from the hydrogen? Controlling hydrogen flow and feed rate is not the easiest thing to accomplish, especially in simple mechanisms in a minimalist method.
Just a couple more warmists solving the entire world’s problems through teacup and tea room solutions.
Occasional Cortex looks forward to 100% renewable energy in 2030 or so.
The “cortex” is yet to be proven… ;>
Turning the surplus energy into hydrogen is an OK idea, especially if the hydrogen then pushes electrons via a fuel cell. However, there is a lot of infrastructure required. Compressors to compress the hydrogen, vessels to store it, and fuel cells to use it. None of these are cheap. Coal is stacked in a huge pile next to the power plant. Much cheaper. I doubt the economics are there without taxpayer support via taxes.
The next question is, what do university professors or governments know about cost?
And why would you build a vast array of solar panels to produce energy you can’t use in the first place?
Solar is expensive and low yield. I suspect this is all ivory tower fantasy. No efficiency figures are cited.
He is probably fishing for another research grant, as usual.
If they want hydrogen for fuel cells, get it from natural gas via steam reforming and water-gas shift reaction:
CH4 + H2O = CO + 3 H2
CO + H2O = CO2 + H2
That’s the industrially economical way to produce hydrogen. Electrolysis of water is for high school science projects
They lost me at Australia exporting hydrogen in support of wind. If you’ve had a breakthrough on hydrogen, you don’t need wind. And your breakthrough is a scientific process that others will copy. So you’re left with exporting water.
“The Australian Government is interested in developing a hydrogen export industry to export our abundant renewable energy,”
So Oz can make an export industry based on exploiting our cheap reliable renewable energy? Is that intended to augment the growing, profitable unicorn breeding industry in this country?