Green hydrogen: ‘Artificial leaf’ becomes better under pressure

Findings can increase the efficiency of electrochemical and photocatalytic devices

02-Aug-2024 - Hydrogen can be produced via the electrolytic splitting of water. One option here is the use of photoelectrodes that convert sunlight into voltage for electrolysis in so called photoelectrochemical cells (PEC cells). A research team at HZB has now shown that the efficiency of PEC cells can be ...

From waste to value: The right electrolytes can enhance glycerol oxidation

"Our research could help to convert biomass by-products into valuable chemicals more efficiently"

03-Jul-2024 - When biomass is converted into biodiesel, huge amounts of glycerol are produced as a by-product. So far, however, this by-product has been little utilised, even though it could be processed into more valuable chemicals through oxidation in photoelectrochemical reactors. The reason for this: low ...

Green hydrogen: Co-production of valuable chemicals boosts profitability

Co-production concept is very flexible; different products can be produced in the same plant depending on demand

10-Oct-2023 - It is clear that it works: There are already approaches today to use solar energy for the electrolysis of water and to produce hydrogen. Unfortunately, this "green" hydrogen has so far been more expensive than "gray" hydrogen from natural gas. But the production of green hydrogen with sunlight ...

Surface analysis of catalyst particles in aqueous solutions

The results are relevant for the development of efficient photoelectrodes for the production of green hydrogen

25-Jul-2023 - Green hydrogen can be produced directly in a photoelectrochemical cell, splitting water with solar energy. However, this requires the development of super-efficient photoelectrodes that need to combine many talents at the same time: They must be excellent at converting sunlight into electricity, ...

Green hydrogen: How photoelectrochemical water splitting may become competitive

22-Mar-2023 - Sunlight can be used to produce green hydrogen directly from water in photoelectrochemical (PEC) cells. So far, systems based on this "direct approach" have not been energetically competitive. However, the balance changes as soon as some of the hydrogen in such PEC cells is used in-situ for a ...

Lithium-Sulfur batteries: First multimodal analysis in pouch cell format

Evaluation shows how the electrolyte affects the formation of unwanted sulphur particles and polysulphides

24-Feb-2022 - Lithium-sulphur (Li/S) batteries have significantly higher energy densities than conventional lithium-ion batteries, but age very quickly. Now, for the first time, a team at HZB has investigated Li/S batteries in the industry-relevant pouch cell format with different electrolytes during ...

Green hydrogen: "Rust" as a photoanode and its limits

“With this new approach, we have added a powerful tool to our arsenal that enables us to identify the realizable potential of photoelectrode materials"

21-Apr-2021 - Metal oxides such as rust are intriguing photoelectrode materials for the production of green hydrogen with sunlight. They are cheap and abundant, but in spite of decades of research, progress has been limited. A team at HZB, together with partners from Ben Gurion University and the Technion, ...

Green hydrogen: buoyancy-driven convection in the electrolyte

For the first time investigated, how the liquid electrolyte throughout the cell behaves during electrolysis

23-Nov-2020 - Hydrogen produced by using solar energy could contribute to a climate neutral energy system of the future. But there are hurdles on the way from laboratory scale to large-scale implementation. A team at HZB has now presented a method to visualise convection in the electrolyte and to reliably ...

Solar hydrogen: Let’s consider the stability of photoelectrodes

How the stability of photoelectrodes and catalysts can be compared and enhanced in the future

28-Oct-2020 - As part of an international collaboration, a team at the HZB has examined the corrosion processes of high-quality BiVO4 photoelectrodes using different state-of-the-art characterisation methods. The result is the first operando stability study of high-purity BiVO4 photoanodes during the ...

New world record for direct solar water-splitting efficiency

06-Jul-2018 - Hydrogen will play a central role as a storage medium in sustainable energy systems. An international team of researchers has now succeeded in raising the efficiency of producing hydrogen from direct solar water-splitting to a record 19 per cent. They did so by combining a tandem solar cell of ...