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Thursday, January 31, 2008 Cheap HydrogenA new process uses sunlight and a nanostructured catalyst to inexpensively and efficiently generate hydrogen for fuel. By Kevin Bullis
Nanoptek, a startup based in Maynard, MA, has developed a new way to make hydrogen from water using solar energy. The company says that its process is cheap enough to compete with the cheapest approaches used now, which strip hydrogen from natural gas, and it has the further advantage of releasing no carbon dioxide. Nanoptek, which has been developing the new technology in part with grants from NASA and the Department of Energy (DOE), recently completed its first venture-capital round, raising $4.7 million that it will use to install its first pilot plant. The technology uses titania, a cheap and abundant material, to capture energy from sunlight. The absorbed energy releases electrons, which split water to make hydrogen. Other researchers have used titania to split water in the past, but Nanoptek researchers found a way to modify titania to absorb more sunlight, which makes the process much cheaper and more efficient, says John Guerra, the company's founder and CEO. Researchers have known since the 1970s that titania can catalyze reactions that split water. But while titania is a good material because it's cheap and doesn't degrade in water, it only absorbs ultraviolet light, which represents a small fraction of the energy in sunlight. Other researchers have tried to increase the amount of sunlight absorbed by pairing titania with dyes or dopants, but dyes aren't nearly as durable as titania, and dopants haven't produced efficient systems, says John Turner, who develops hydrogen generation technologies at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), in Golden, CO. Nanoptek's approach uses insights from the semiconductor industry to make titania absorb more sunlight. Guerra says that chip makers have long known that straining a material so that its atoms are slightly pressed together or pulled apart alters the material's electronic properties. He found that depositing a coating of titania on dome-like nanostructures caused the atoms to be pulled apart. "When you pull the atoms apart, less energy is required to knock the electrons out of orbit," he says. "That means you can use light with lower energy--which means visible light" rather than just ultraviolet light. The strain on the atoms also affects the way that electrons move through the material. Too much strain, and the electrons tend to be reabsorbed by the material before they split water. Guerra says that the company has had to find a balance between absorbing more sunlight and allowing the electrons to move freely out of the material. Nanoptek has also developed cheaper ways to manufacture the nanostructured materials. Initially, the company used DVD manufacturing processes, but it has since moved on to a still-cheaper proprietary process. |
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Hydrogen from Algae
09/27/2007
Comments
tsaidak on 01/31/2008 at 2:15 AM
4
How much does this hydrogen COST!??
I can't judge the technology unless they state a price per unit. Is this $20.00/gal of gasoline equivalent or $2.00/gal of gasoline equivalent? Until someone can state a price, this is no different then the pie in the sky claims for nuclear reactors in the 1950's.
mkogrady on 01/31/2008 at 1:54 PM
72
djs on 01/31/2008 at 3:56 AM
16
dnweiss on 01/31/2008 at 3:35 PM
2
djs on 02/04/2008 at 3:34 AM
16
rttedrow on 01/31/2008 at 8:08 AM
26
killian on 01/31/2008 at 11:55 AM
54
The other question is what pressure hydrogen is produced? (Is a separate compression step required?)
KGC on 01/31/2008 at 12:57 PM
1
brunascle on 01/31/2008 at 1:11 PM
Web Developer
69
mkogrady on 01/31/2008 at 1:40 PM
72
who_knows on 01/31/2008 at 7:41 PM
3
1) Just to grow corn for ethanol production you need 100s of times the amount of water per unit of ethanol. This process needs just 10 units of water for 1 unit of hydrogen.
2) Water can be desalinated cheaply in energy terms. 1kg of hydrogen (which needs 10kg of water to be made) contains enough energy to desalinate 4000l of water.
who_knows on 01/31/2008 at 7:51 PM
3
michro on 02/01/2008 at 8:29 AM
3
MakeSense on 01/31/2008 at 2:09 PM
61
The amount of water - salt water does not work - would be enormous. Recall that 89% of the weight of water is Oxygen, so it takes 10 pounds of water to get a pound of Hydrogen, assuming perfect efficiency.
Virtually every technique employed to improve renewable hydrogen does a much better job improving PV cell efficiency, which is already well above any hydrogen technology. Anyone putting up the cash would likely spend it on PV cells or better, which need no water.
Also, the oxygen produced with hydrogen is caustic, so many of these ideas literally fall apart.
Beyond that, what do you do next? As one post mentioned, there would be compressors and pipes and storage tanks, followed by more pipes and electric generators (in the case of storage) or a hypothetical fuel cell.
prodevman on 01/31/2008 at 3:31 PM
1
Hydrogen is what powers the Electric Grid. If the Oil Companies want to be part of this let them buy the Electric Companies.
GreenPlease on 01/31/2008 at 9:40 PM
3
Sourcing the carbon would never be much of an issue (one could always resort to biomass). Methane could also be easily created.
Another option would be creating a synthetic high performance aviation fuel.
While I'm ranting, I'll go ahead and make the obvious statement that the oxygen is also a valuable by product. Stored/transported seperately it (O2) will be of extreme value in organic rankine cycle turbines in the near future.
Siphon on 02/04/2008 at 12:19 PM
65
Of course, it mostly depends on what the economics are like.
TimG on 02/01/2008 at 11:08 AM
8
Biotele on 02/03/2008 at 3:04 PM
8
http://www.instructables.com/id/SODA-CAN-HYDROGEN-GENERATOR/
DJTal on 02/05/2008 at 9:38 AM
109
skipcjr on 03/15/2008 at 12:15 AM
6
vc on 05/14/2008 at 7:54 PM
1
Let's form a company to develop hydrogen production using direct solar.
Let's get the public to fund the initial research by investing in a lobyist.
Then let's get venture capitalists to fund the production R&D.
We can patent it (using the US legal system of course) then license the manufacture offshore (avoiding the high labor costs and legal exposure to that same legal system we wanted to protect our patent and intellectual property) and then sell it to the US consumer and never pay the public a penny.
Then we can buy a G5, avoid the airport security, screw our hookers enroute, and generally live a well deserved priviledged life, while the rest of the rodents squirm to put a meal on the table.
Sounds good to me.
Little known fact; 0.9% of the US population holds 94.6% of the US equity.
vonofdallas on 05/17/2008 at 1:41 PM
1
randy00789 on 06/10/2008 at 11:31 AM
1
Are you selling these units yet? If so what kind of costs are involved? I am working up a grant proposal for funding so hopefully in a few months I will have the funding and can purchase a system.
Thanks and God bless,
Randy
941-240-1060