Scientists at the University of Adelaide in Australia have developed a device that enables the production of green hydrogen from salty seawater. Previously, hydrogen fuel was produced with natural gas or through electrolysis with fresh water, but this new device uses a cheap catalyst and a commercial electrolyzer to extract hydrogen from raw seawater.
Electrolysis splits water into oxygen and hydrogen using electricity. Using seawater instead of freshwater could make hydrogen production more sustainable, since accessible freshwater represents only 1% of the total amount of water on Earth. The new system avoids the erosion of the materials and the formation of insoluble precipitates by adding an acid substance on the common catalysts.
The device has been developed by a team of researchers led by chemical engineer Shizhang Qiao from the University of Adelaide in Australia.
It’s not the first time we’ve seen something like this. Scientists in China and Australia recently developed a prototype device designed to float on the ocean surface and split hydrogen from seawater using solar power, and we recently saw how they harvest water from moist air to make fresh water.
Of course, prototyping is a long way from industrial-scale methods, but it’s important to pay attention to every step at this point. In this case, Qiao and his colleagues believe that their modified catalysts may make it to market, as their system can deliver similar results to a commercial electrolyzer under the same low temperatures and operating conditions.
The research has been published in Nature Energy.