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With Professor Samuel Mao's team at UC Berkeley in the U.S., Professor Yu's research team developed a new H-doped [hydrogen doped] photocatalyst by removing oxygen from the photocatalyst surface made of titanium dioxide and filling hydrogen into it through the decomposition of MgH2. Energy of long wavelength including visible light could not be used for the existing white Titanium dioxide because it has a wide band gap energy. However, the development of MgH2 reduction could overcome this through oxygen flaw induction and H-doping while enabling the use of solar light with 570nm-wavelength.
MgH2 reduction can synthesize new matters by applying to Titanium oxide used in this research as well as the oxides composed of other atoms such as Zr, Zn, and Fe. This method is applicable to various other fields such as photocatalyst and secondary battery. The photocatalyst synthesized in this research has four times higher photoactivity than the existing white titanium dioxide and is not difficult to manufacture, thus being very advantageous for hydrogen mass production.
Chemistry professor Shannon Stahl leads a team that designed a fuel cell using cheaper materials and a redesigned compound, which helps the flow of electrons and protons that convert chemical energy into electricity. He says the new process replaces the expensive metal platinum as the catalyst.
"Bypassing the need for platinum would be a major breakthrough. There are strategies that exist right now that are just not meeting the metrics that are needed. And so, conceiving of novel approaches, new strategies to overcome this limitation is really what we're trying to pursue in this project," Stahl said.
Stahl says his research, published this month in the journal Joule, has found that cobalt — a lower-cost metal — can be used instead, with some modifications to the process.
originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF
a reply to: Blue Shift
Found something out today.
First, I was reading this at the National Law Review: DOE Announces Collaborative Project On Hydrogen And Fuel Cells.
Where the DOE has signed MOU with the Army to investigate hydrogen fuel cells, production, and infrastructure.
Well, they also mention the DOE's H2@ Scale
H2@ Scale is a concept that explores the potential for wide-scale hydrogen production and utilization in the United States to enable resiliency of the power generation and transmission sectors, while also aligning diverse multibillion dollar domestic industries, domestic competitiveness, and job creation.
energy.gov - H2@ Scale.
The concept has been up and running for 2 years! They have a info graphic showing what the full infrastructure would like based upon hydrogen within current settings. The entire side of the "Hydrogen Economy"!
It is an "addition to" view instead of complete replacement of another energy segment (coal, gas, or oil). But it also a closed loop.
Somebody has been doing some "forward thinking" for once!
MarineMax and Joi Scientific will undertake joint development to bring H2-based energy solutions to leading vendors in the marine industry.
Hydrogen 2.0 is the world’s first H2 production process based on the clean and affordable extraction of H2 directly from untreated seawater, on-demand, at the point of use. Hydrogen 2.0 technology will allow MarineMax to power boats, yachts, and ships using direct combustion, hybrid electric, or fuel cells to convert the H2 to power. This power can be used for multiple applications—including auxiliary power for lighting, heating, cooling, and cabin services, in addition to primary or secondary propulsion of any vessel.
Our H2@Scale initiative brings together stakeholders and national labs to figure out how to provide affordable hydrogen production, transport, and storage to be used across multiple sectors like steel manufacturing, energy storage, and other transportation modes including truck, rail, and maritime. Hydrogen technologies can be coupled with nuclear power plants to generate an additional revenue stream. Many utilities are now considering integrating nuclear energy production with other industrial processes to optimize thermal and electrical energy production.
Ammonia, key precursor for fertilizer production, convenient hydrogen carrier and emerging clean fuel, plays a pivotal role in sustaining life on earth. Currently, the main route for NH3 synthesis is via the heterogeneous catalytic Haber-Bosch process (N2+3H2 - 2NH3), which proceeds under extreme conditions of temperature and pressure with a very large carbon footprint. Herein we report that a pristine nitrogen-doped nanoporous graphitic carbon membrane (NCM) can electrochemically convert N2 into NH3 in an aqueous acidic solution under ambient conditions. The Faradaic efficiency and rate of production of NH3 on the NCM electrode reach 5.2% and 0.08 g m-2 h-1, respectively. After functionalization of the NCM with Au nanoparticles (Au NPs) these performance metrics are dramatically enhanced to 22% and 0.36 g m-2 h-1, respectively. These efficiencies and rates for the production of NH3 at room temperature and atmospheric pressure are unprecedented. As this system offers the potential to be scaled to industrial proportions there is a high likelihood it might displace the century old Haber-Bosch process.
[Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory]’s patent-pending design is a single hybrid photoelectrochemical and voltaic (HPEV) cell. The HPEV makes dual use of its photon-excited electrons and thus maximizes its overall efficiency, much as cogeneration power plants achieve high fuel efficiency by squeezing both heat and power from natural gas or coal.
...
Better still, the HPEV cell can be electrically modulated. “You have a reservoir of charges, and you can choose if you want to direct it to hydrogen production or to electricity, depending on the cost of electricity right now,” says Segev. That functionality could be crucial for 100-percent-renewable power grids such as those that Hawaii’s utilities are mandated to build. When demand surges or wind power falls off, hydrogen cogeneration plants equipped with HPEV cells could boost their power output by half to keep the grid balanced.
Hydrogen production for fuel requires splitting water molecules (H2O) into two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. The research reveals a breakthrough toward understanding the mechanism that occurs during the photochemical splitting of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) over iron-oxide photo-electrodes, which involves splitting the photo-oxidation reaction from linear to two sites.
The project's pilot site was recently inaugurated by Air Liquide, the company that is coordinating HyBalance. As explained in a press release, the electrolyser, "with a capacity of 1.2 MW, enables the production of around 500 kg of hydrogen a day without releasing CO2." This will be enough for 1 000 cars and can also be supplied to hydrogen buses and forklifts, according to a presentation on the project website. Besides industrial customers, the hydrogen that's produced is used to supply the network of five hydrogen stations installed and operated in Denmark.
Manganese is known for making stainless steel and aluminum soda cans. Now, researchers say the metal could advance one of the most promising sources of renewable energy: hydrogen fuel cells.
In a study published today (Oct. 29, 2018) in the journal Nature Catalysis, a University at Buffalo-led research team reports on catalysts made from the widely available and inexpensive metal.
...
[Gang Wu] discovered that adding nitrogen to manganese causes internal changes to the metal that makes it a more stable element. In experiments reported in the study, he devised a relatively simple two-step method of adding carbon and a form of nitrogen called tetranitrogen to manganese.
A Palo Alto hydrogen fueling station located between Mountain View and South San Francisco is the latest station to join California’s evolving hydrogen fuel infrastructure.
David Gidlund, co-owner of the Barron Park Shell station, where the hydrogen fueling system will be installed, said that he and his father made the decision to install the station for both the benefit it brings to the environment, and for the longevity of their business. Having this station allows them to offer something that other gas stations typically don’t have.
The company behind a first-of-its-kind hydrogen energy project in the North Country says it could cut energy costs in half for local businesses.
The Utah-based company, called Q Hydrogen Solutions, is turning part of Groveton’s former Wausau Paper Mill into a hydrogen power plant.
It will strip hydrogen molecules out of water, and use that hydrogen to power engines.
The Nebraska Public Power District has begun designing and planning for the conversion of a coal-fueled power plant to a hydrogen-fueled source of electricity.
The Sheldon Station, located outside of Hallam, Nebraska, will eliminate coal in favor of hydrogen in an effort reduce around a million tons of CO2 emissions. The change was announced last year.
NPPD partnered with Monolith Materials, a company that produces excess amounts of hydrogen as a byproduct of manufacturing carbon black. The Monolith factory, currently under construction, will provide the hydrogen and help with the conversion project.
Carbon black (subtypes are acetylene black, channel black, furnace black, lamp black and thermal black) is a material produced by the incomplete combustion of heavy petroleum products such as FCC tar, coal tar, or ethylene cracking tar.
...
Carbon black is mainly used as a reinforcing filler in tires and other rubber products. In plastics, paints, and inks, carbon black is used as a color pigment.
Wikipedia.
The Electriq Global system contains three key elements, according to a company press release. “The liquid fuel (Electriq~Fuel) which reacts with a catalyst (Electriq~Switch) to release hydrogen on demand, then the exhausted fuel is captured and taken back to an Electriq~Recycling plant where it is replenished with hydrogen for re-use. This entire process is inherently safe and releases zero emissions.”
The Electriq system uses a standardized fuel tank and would reportedly cost less than half the equivalent gasoline price to fill up. Furthermore, it would deliver approximately twice the range of gasoline.
HyperSolar’s research team at the University of Iowa published their results in Frontiers in Chemistry, a peer-reviewed scientific journal that details news and breakthroughs within scientific disciplines including electrochemical energy storage and conversion, electrochemical materials science, electrocatalyst and photoelectrochemistry etc. The published paper highlights the scientific team’s successful stable hydrogen production using the ultra-low Pt [platinum] loaded 3D carbon foam that showed excellent mass activities superior to the state-of-the-art commercial platinum/carbon catalyst.
The research, led by Professor Syed Mubeen, utilizes cheap carbon foam support with high surface area as base substrate to load ultra-low amounts of platinum (10x lower than the state-of-the-art commercial electrodes) for efficient and stable production of hydrogen.
Researchers Julie Renner and Mohan Sankaran have come up with a new way to create ammonia from nitrogen and water at low temperature and low pressure. They've done it successfully so far in a laboratory without using hydrogen or the solid metal catalyst necessary in traditional processes.
"Our approach—an electrolytic process with a plasma—is completely new," said Mohan Sankaran, the Goodrich Professor of Engineering Innovation at the Case School of Engineering.
Plasmas, often referred to as the fourth state of matter (apart from solid, liquid or gas), are ionized clouds of gas, consisting of positive ions and free electrons, which give it the unique ability to activate chemical bonds, including the rather challenging nitrogen molecule, at room temperature.
Renner, a Climo Assistant Professor in the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department, added that because this new process doesn't need high pressure or high temperature or hydrogen, it makes it scalable—"the ideal kind of technology for a much smaller plant, one with high potential to be powered by renewable energy."
The results of their two-year collaboration were published this month in the journal Science Advances.
"Our approach is similar to electrolytic synthesis of ammonia, which has gained interest as an alternative to Haber-Bosch because it can be integrated with renewable energy," Sankaran said. "However, like the Birkeland-Eyde process, we use a plasma, which is energy intensive. Electricity is still a barrier, but less so now, and with the increase in renewables, it may not be a barrier at all in the future.
"And perhaps most significantly, our process does not produce hydrogen gas," he said. "This has been the major bottleneck of other electrolytic approaches to forming ammonia from water (and nitrogen), the undesirable formation of hydrogen."
The Renner-Sankaran process also does not use a solid metal catalyst that could be one of the reasons ammonia is obtained instead of hydrogen.
"In our system, the ammonia is formed at the interface of a gas plasma and liquid water surface and forms freely in solution," Sankaran said.
The army researchers discovered the unique properties of the nanogalvanic aluminum powder during their investigation of aluminum alloy compositions for other purposes.
Specifically, it was researchers from the lab’s Lightweight and Specialty Metals Branch who made the discovery that one of the compositions can spontaneously generate hydrogen with rapid efficiency in the presence of water.
“The researchers have since demonstrated rapid hydrogen generation rates using powder and tablet forms of the alloy,” said Branch Chief Robert Dowding, reported Phys.org. “The hydrogen has been shown to be useful for powering fuel cells and is expected to power internal combustion engines,” Dowding revealed.
The Army Research Laboratory posted a Federal Register Notice and launched a supporting website that invites companies to submit their ideas on how to best commercialize this unique technology.
After gathering ideas, the laboratory intends to select what it deems to be the most appropriate partners and collaborators. From there, officials have said license exclusivity will then be determined.
The initial advertisement and request for commercialization plan ended on September 4, 2018. The process enabled companies to obtain technical information, samples and converse with inventors for the purpose of “technical due diligence.”