Scientists from the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney, Australia have demonstrated a much cheaper and sustainable way to create hydrogen required to power cars.
In research published in Nature Communications recently, scientists from UNSW, Griffith University and Swinburne University of Technology showed that capturing hydrogen by splitting it from oxygen in water can be achieved by using low-cost metals like iron and nickel as catalysts, which speed up this chemical reaction while requiring less energy.
Iron and nickel, which are found in abundance on Earth, would replace precious metals ruthenium, platinum and iridium that up until now are regarded as benchmark catalysts in the ‘water-splitting’ process.
UNSW School of Chemistry’s Professor Chuan Zhao said in water splitting, two electrodes apply an electric charge to water which enables hydrogen to be split from oxygen and used as energy in a fuel cell.
... to continue reading you must be subscribed
