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This could be a game changer. I've been dreaming of this for years... using solar energy to directly generate hydrogen from water to use later as a fuel.
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Professor of Chemistry at UNC’s College of Arts and Sciences Tom Meyer says. ”Our new findings may provide a last major piece of a puzzle for a new way to store the sun’s energy, it could be a tipping point for a solar energy future.”
A new device is known as a dye-sensitized photoelectrosynthesis cell. It generates hydrogen fuel by using the energy off the Sun to split water into it’s component parts. After the split, hydrogen is sequenced and stored while oxygen is released.
Meyer says splitting water is very difficult. The process involves taking four electrons away from two water molecules, and transferring them elsewhere to make hydrogen. After that you must keep the hydrogen seperate from the oxygen, Oxygen is the byproduct. Designing molecules capable of that is a really big challenge.
Batteries are a distraction: the best way to store excess solar energy for nighttime use is using it to create "solar fuels" that rely on energy-dense chemistry, one research team has concluded. The prototype takes a cue from plants and uses a new type of solar cell that relies on the sun's energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. The latter is released, but the former can be stored and then later used for power, including potential in fuel-cell cars. Best of all, the system requires no external power source in order to work its hydrogen-generating magic.
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The tipping point was a nanoparticle coating of titanium dioxide, which accelerates the rate at which electrons can be carried away. Meanwhile, a protective coating to the chromophore-catalyst keeps it more effectively tethered to the nanoparticle, addressing issues with keeping the layers attached.
According to Meyer, while the technology may sound complex, it's actually based for the most part on existing technology, and is far more feasible than the idea of turning solar energy into electricity and then trying to stockpile that in huge battery arrays. As the project lead says, "the most energy dense way to store energy is in the chemical bonds of molecules."
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