"Captain, I must have some platinum. A small amount should be sufficient -- 4 or 5 pounds.."
Posted on 08/01/2008 6:34:26 AM PDT by Red Badger
It has long been the Holy Grail of environmental scientists, but researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) are confident they have found an inexpensive way of producing hydrogen from water, paving the way for the widespread adoption of zero carbon fuel cells capable of powering buildings and cars.
The technique is similar to the way photosynthesis works in plants and is based on a new catalyst that can split water at room temperature to create hydrogen and oxygen.
The catalyst consists of cobalt metal, phosphate and an electrode that is placed into water. When electricity runs through the electrode, the cobalt and phosphate form a thin film on the electrode, and oxygen gas is produced. Another catalyst, such as platinum, can then be added to produce hydrogen gas from the water.
James Barber, Ernst Chain Professor of Biochemistry at Imperial College London hailed the discovery as a huge breakthrough in the fight to reduce carbon emissions. "This is a major discovery with enormous implications for the future prosperity of humankind," he said. "The importance of their discovery cannot be overstated since it opens up the door for developing new technologies for energy production thus reducing our dependence for fossil fuels and addressing the global climate change problem."
The process has many potential applications, but Daniel Nocera and Matthew Kanan, are convinced that its primary use will be to improve the reliability of solar energy systems.
Nocera said that power from photovoltaic cells generated during the day could be used to feed the catalyst water and create hydrogen and oxygen that could then be combined at night top provide power for a building or recharge an electric car.
"This is the nirvana of what we've been talking about for years," he said. " Solar power has always been a limited, far-off solution. Now we can seriously think about solar power as unlimited and soon."
The researchers admitted that further work needs to be done to integrate the technology with solar panels and increase the amount of electrical current the catalyst can handle. However, Nocera said he hoped that within ten years homeowners could be using the technology to run their homes from entirely clean energy, with solar panels providing power during the day and a household fuel cell generating electricity throughout the night.
Hydrogen ping!........
Read about it this morning earlier. Hope it is true. If it is, it would be a big step towards energy independence.
Will nancy pelosi then save the planet by disallowing water wells? Jus’ aksin’...
What is a boffin?
Sounds fantastic. Almost too good to be true.
chiefly British : a scientific expert; especially : one involved in technological research
This still requires electricity to provide the energy to split the water. You will never, ever, get out as much energy from recombining the H2 and O2 as it took to split it.
That’s the Law!
We’ll need to protect the Earth’s precious bodily fluid...
"Captain, I must have some platinum. A small amount should be sufficient -- 4 or 5 pounds.."
Many related..
http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/hydrogen/index?tab=articles
Where does this electricity come from? Wind, solar ... or coal-fired, or nuclear power plants. Same old, same old. Electrolysis of water isn't new, and it isn't a way to make "cheap" hydrogen, except when electricity is cheap. It is certainly no solution to America's energy problem.
Be careful of the boffins. They might knacker your lorry and put you into a boot...........
“When electricity runs through the electrode...”
Just another of what I call the “Steve Martin” solution to our energy problems. Remember the great Steve Martin routine on “How you can have a Million Dollars and not pay taxes?”
The first line is “First, Get a Million Dollars.”
Same with this. Sure, we can make hydrogen from water in great quantities. And we can use great quantities of electricity to do so. Now where is the electricity going to come from?
My guess, and I am neither physicist or chemist, is that you will always use more energy in separating the hydrogen from oxygen in water than you will gain in recombining them. Otherwise you’d have a “water reactor” that constantly made energy by separating and recombining hydrogen & oxygen and generated surplus power to boot. You can do it. It’s contrary to the principle of entropy.
Please read my previous post.
How is this different from sticking two electrodes in inverted, water filled test tubes and turning on the juice to make O2 and H2 like I did when I was a kid?
Yeah, because once we separate the hydrogen from the oxygen, that water is GONE FOREVER!
We’ll be beholden to Big Cobalt and Big Platinum companies making obscene profits as they try to keep up with an already losing battle to supply the demand for precious metals.
NO WAR FOR PLATINUM! : )
Worse yet... They could knock you up early..
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