Posted on 12/15/2022 11:12:02 AM PST by Red Badger
They say their invention offers a promising way to tap into a plentiful supply of cheap hydrogen fuel for transportation and other sectors, which could radically reduce carbon emissions and help fight climate change.
By using high-frequency vibrations to “divide and conquer” individual water molecules during electrolysis, the team managed to split the water molecules to release 14 times more hydrogen compared with standard electrolysis techniques.
Electrolysis involves electricity running through water with two electrodes to split water molecules into oxygen and hydrogen gases, which appear as bubbles. This process produces green hydrogen, which represents just a small fraction of hydrogen production globally due to the high energy required.
Most hydrogen is produced from splitting natural gas, known as blue hydrogen, which emits greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
The team's invention offers a promising way to tap into a plentiful supply of cheap hydrogen fuel for transportation and other sectors, which could radically reduce carbon emissions and help fight climate change. Credit: Adobe Stock
Associate Professor Amgad Rezk from RMIT University, who led the work, said the team’s innovation tackles big challenges for green hydrogen production.
“One of the main challenges of electrolysis is the high cost of electrode materials used, such as platinum or iridium,” said Rezk from RMIT’s School of Engineering.
“With sound waves making it much easier to extract hydrogen from water, it eliminates the need to use corrosive electrolytes and expensive electrodes such as platinum or iridium.
“As water is not a corrosive electrolyte, we can use much cheaper electrode materials such as silver.”
The ability to use low-cost electrode materials and avoiding the use of highly corrosive electrolytes were gamechangers for lowering the costs of producing green hydrogen, Rezk said.
The research is published in Advanced Energy Materials. An Australian provisional patent application has been filed to protect the new technology.
First author Yemima Ehrnst said the sound waves also prevented the build-up of hydrogen and oxygen bubbles on the electrodes, which greatly improved its conductivity and stability.
“Electrode materials used in electrolysis suffer from hydrogen and oxygen gas build-up, forming a gas layer that minimises the electrodes’ activity and significantly reduces its performance,” said Ehrnst, a PhD researcher at RMIT’s School of Engineering.
As part of their experiments the team measured the amount of hydrogen produced through electrolysis with and without sound waves from the electrical output.
“The electrical output of the electrolysis with sound waves was about 14 times greater than electrolysis without them, for a given input voltage. This was equivalent to the amount of hydrogen produced,” Ehrnst said.
PhD researcher Yemima Ehrnst holding the acoustic device the research team used to boost the hydrogen production, through electrolysis to split water. Credit: RMIT University
The potential applications of the team’s work
Distinguished Professor Leslie Yeo, one of the lead senior researchers, said the team’s breakthrough opened the door to using this new acoustic platform for other applications, especially where bubble build-up on the electrodes was a challenge.
“Our ability to suppress bubble build-up on the electrodes and rapidly remove them through high-frequency vibrations represents a major advance for electrode conductivity and stability,” said Yeo from RMIT’s School of Engineering.
“With our method, we can potentially improve the conversion efficiency leading to a net-positive energy saving of 27%.”
Next steps
While the innovation is promising, the team needs to overcome challenges with integrating the sound-wave innovation with existing electrolysers to scale up the work.
"We are keen to collaborate with industry partners to boost and complement their existing electrolyser technology and integrate into existing processes and systems," Yeo said.
"Acoustically-Induced Water Frustration for Enhanced Hydrogen Evolution Reaction in Neutral Electrolytes" is published in Advanced Energy Materials (DOI: 10.1002/aenm.202203164).
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/aenm.202203164
The co-authors are Yemima Ehrnst, Amgad Rezk and Leslie Yeo from RMIT and Peter Sherrell from the University of Melbourne.
Or ‘pink’ or ‘rainbow’...................
Standard electrolysis produces hydrogen at about 70 to 80 percent efficiency. So this team is claiming to produce hydrogen at 980 to 1,120 percent efficiency?!?
Next they'll be claiming they can teach pigs to sing.
You are comparing apples to watermelons................
the number on green house gas is water vapor and they want to use a fuel that’s after use emissions is water vapor.
ugh.
Mountain is the only band to ever run me out of a large concert hell.
The loudest I ever played on was an outdoor concert about 6 years ago. I was admiring the soundman’s power racks and he said, “You know how many watts of power they had at Woodstock?”
Me: “No”
SM: 5,500. Know how many I have here?
Me: “No”
SM: 8,500.
Later I heard from people 1/2 mile away who said it sounded great. At their house.
How so?
The claim is “14 times more hydrogen” not 14 times more efficient................
Saw them, too.
Only I can’t remember where................
Saw them in Edmonton in 2011. I was at the far end of the stadium in the nosebleed section, and was glad I brought my custom earplugs. It was LOUD! Pretty cool looking DOWN on the Gryphon (Huey H-2) helicopters as they flew through the stadium, though.
you are forgetting about hamster farts
Go with Nickelback... you want the hydrogen bubbles so aggravated, they’ll be driven away at higher rates.
If nothing else, “high-frequency” sound waves are the easiest to produce in terms of energy requirements.
The non-scientist say “ the team managed to split the water molecules to release 14 times more hydrogen compared with standard electrolysis techniques”.
Not the same thing. What electrical output? Electrolysis is endergonic ( requires energy, doesn’t release it.)
Maybe she meant, “this process requires 14x higher input energy”. Which begs the question, where did the energy go?
“Show me the free hydrogen”. And by the way, net energy efficiency after separation from the oxygen.
“By using high-frequency vibrations to “divide and conquer” individual water molecules during electrolysis, the team managed to split the water molecules to release 14 times more hydrogen compared with standard electrolysis techniques.”
Ok, now how much power did the high-frequency emitters consume?
Could they use heavy water to start?
Then your hydrogen might fuse.............
Cool stuff! And may actually be put to use.
Anything approaching cheap energy will be a money maker.
That said, Hydrogen has many rules to follow, and “Remember the Hindenberg”.
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