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Using Sun's Energy to Split Water Means Solar Power All Night
phorm writes "Reuters is carrying an article about a recent MIT development which may pave the way for solar-energy to be collected for use in low-input periods. According to Reuters, the discovery of the a new catalyst for separating hydrogen+oxygen from water requires only 10% of the electricity of current methods. This would allow storage-cells to function as a form of battery for other forms of energy-collection, such as solar panels. The new method is also much safer (and likely environmentally friendly) than current methods, which require the use of a dangerously caustic environment, and specialized storage containers." sanjosanjo points out coverage of the process at EE Times, which features the MIT group's press release.
"...with our catalyst almost 100 percent of the current used for electrolysis goes into making oxygen and hydrogen."
If that is true (although I definitely have my doubts, as tales and empty promises of the past have made all of us highly skeptical when we read something like this), then it should open the road for a significantly more efficient means of producing hydrogen for hydrogen powered cars / devices. Hell a car equipped with a solar cell could just bake during the day to recharge itself and be ready to go for the commute home come 5pm. Though until I hear a confirmation of MIT's findings from another university/respected source, I hold on to my severe doubts about this.
First open sourcing solaris and now this.
Way to go Sun!
This would be a big win for any kind of "environmental" energy source (wind, waves, caged toddlers) that isn't always on.
Heck, it would make a great general-purpose home UPS and/or load leveler. If properly integrated, a home equipped with this would be less vulnerable to brownouts and blackouts. Local storage would make the job of power companies easier too.
Fingers crossed.
What are the implications for things such as water purification, desalination, etc?
Seems like a fuel cell "battery" is just the tip of the iceberg.
Now we only have to solve the problem of storing a very flammable gas and possibly an incredibly powerful oxidizer!
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
'nuff said.
Scientist and Gamer...
According to Reuters, the discovery of the a new catalyst for separating hydrogen+oxygen from water requires only 10% of the electricity of current methods
Great. So when do we see it? If it's anything like almost every other "alternative energy" advancement, it will either get snapped up by an oil-company owned holding company, or strangled by licensing fees/requirements/exclusivity deals.
Seriously- let's take a look back. Have there been any major advancements in solar energy technology in the last fifty or so years?
MIT = MIT Technology Licensing Office, and I used to work there. Six figure checks to professors were not uncommon...and it was the only part of the university that turned a profit.
It'd be really refreshing to see scientists develop a bit of altruism. It's the ultimate Open Source, and they'd be guaranteed decades, if not centuries, of good will and fame. That's worth a lot more than a few *possible* royalty checks.
Please help metamoderate.
I can't believe that this hasn't been tagged "vaporware" yet
It is established FACT that Hydrogen is very difficult to contain. It leaks through the tightest seals like they were swiss cheese, and once free it races into the atmosphere and escapes into space.
This is not a major problem when all our hydrogen comes from the deep deposit hydrogen mines in Australia and Canada, but what if this new discovery hearalds an age of wholesail water mining? Do these so-called scientists not realise that we cannot have water without hydrogen? Have they forgotten that humans are 80% water? That water makes our crops grow and our fish swim?? Our life's blood could be literally floating away!
This irresponsible god-gaming may save us from peak oil today, but our grandchildren tomorrow will be facing PEAK WATER if these experiments are allowed to continue!
Write to your political representative today!
Repton.
They say that only an experienced wizard can do the tengu shuffle.
>> It'd be really refreshing to see scientists develop a bit of altruism. It's the ultimate Open Source, and they'd be guaranteed decades, if not centuries, of good will and fame. That's worth a lot more than a few *possible* royalty checks.
Altruism neither pays for the scientists' mortgages nor pays for all the equipment they use to develop their theories.
I'm all for smacking down ridiculously-long copyrights, invalidating silly trademarks or getting rid of obvious patents (one-click shopping?), but this is the _exact_ thing that patents is supposed to support. These scientists (and by proxy, their granteurs (sp?)) took a gamble on developing a technology and they were successful. They should be rewarded for that success like any other person in society. Without that potential for gains, there's no reason to even try.
-Bucky
If you read the actual article (you need to be a AAAS member or otherwise have access to Science), you would see that that these MIT guys are using a cobalt oxide catalyst which is created during the electrolysis of water. Yeah, it's really efficient, which is good (I don't know that I buy the green thing), but it's also self-repairing. Although it seems to be future work, they're envisioning tailoring the chemistry so that the activity of the catalyst is maintained by an equilibrium of dissolving and redeposition of the catalyst electrode. As a bonus, it looks really easy to make.
50 years ago was 1958. Interestingly enough., that was the year the first solar panels went to space. Today, you can sit right there in your chair, do some googling, whip out your credit card and have dandy solar panels shipped right to your house at less than NASA cost plus pricing levels. That's pretty significant. A few years previous to that, some of the first ones were running $1,785 dollars per watt, and those are unadjusted dollars. Today you can look for deals and get them at around 5 bucks a watt. Not too shabby. And nanosolar started shipping this year, albeit all of it to Germany where demand is higher and they will pay a bit more now, because they know conventional will be going up fast later, so they did a whole nation push for it starting some years ago. That and it is cleaner.
here's the wiki ref for the figures, Solar timeline
I bought mine at actually a little under 5 bucks a watt some years ago. silicon demand has been going more for throw away gadgets and so on in the meantime, but several new fabs go online this year and next year so prices will be dropping again.
For one, professors have to get grants to do their research, so they are sometimes given to overstatement to that end. They are, after all, only human which means that not all of them are honest. Also, some are simply unrealistic. They think they can do something, so they announce it, even though they have no idea how to get there, and then maybe never end up doing so. Finally sometimes shit just ends up being impossible. It looks good, seems like things will work, however in the end you can't make it happen. That happens with research. You can spend millions only to realise you've been down a dead end and there's nothing to be done about it.
I agree an announcement from a major university is much more credible than some startup, but don't think things out of universities aren't overstated at times.
Average commute is 15 miles.
Average electric car uses 300 watt/hours per mile (after recoving energy from braking)
Cost effective solar cells are 15%
Surface area of a car is 1.5 square meters.
Solar insulation is 1 kw/h for 5 hous a day (on average)
SOOO...
1.5 square meters * 15% * 1000 watts * 5 hours = 1125 watt/hours
The average commute is 15 miles * 300 watts-hours = 4500 watt/hours consumed.
Solar powered cars won't work until solar cell efficiencies are 50% or better.
Not to mention, have you seen the waste products? I wouldn't call 'em "environmentally friendly"!
Actually the way the waste is treated now it's unsustainable. However it would be sustainable if that "waste" were composted and made into humanure. If you garden, depending on what you grow in the garden, your plants will love you for watering them with your urine. Not straight mind you, nitrogen burn can kill them, but by mixing 10 parts water to one part urine. They would also love it if they were watered with greywater. That's what I did for a while, my bathtub was clogged for a while before the owner sent a plumber. So I'd use the grey water from showering to water my garden. Those who have commented about the garden said it looks real good, another gardener asked how I got my tomato and tomatillo plants so big.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Large format NiMH batteries.
Marketed as the Panasonic EV-95. Or rather, not marketed. You can't buy them. The only vehicles they are currently in now (no pun intended) are three hundred some-odd Toyota RAV4-EVs.
If they are ever sold for use to power traction motors in an electric vehicle, Cobasys will slap Panasonic with an injunction to stop. And you can't buy them at any price other than in very large quantities, and the only people who can buy such large quantities are automakers. Some would say "Not a scam" but the licensing of the technology to exclude certain forms of transportation is REAL.
Who's Cobasys? Just the joint venture between the inventor of the battery, ECD Ovonics, and -- wait for it -- Chevron.
Here are a few citations and examples. Although things seem to be getting better, as they are being licensed in some hybrids now, and they may be expanded to more applications in the future...
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens.
Apparently, it must be against the law to use any surface but the car's to generate its solar energy! ; ) A typical garage (22' x 22') with a south facing shed style roof is approximately 54 square meters. Plugging that into your formula gives 40500 watt/hrs produced, nearly 10X what your formula says is needed. The only thing holding it back is the storage capability of the car. With suitable storage we can do this now! BTW, insulation refers to the slowing down of heat transfer. The word representing the amount of solar radiation on a surface is insolation. Otherwise, thanks for attempting to quantify the subject, most people (on both sides) just go off half cocked.
Why would you want to provide hydrogen for powering vehicles if you've got such great batteries?
Because batteries aren't so great. They're only reasonably efficient when they're nice and warm, they're heavy, they're expensive, and they wear out fast.
The paper is published in a peer reviewed journal. It's patented, not secret.
They used ITO glass as an electrode with a neutral KPi electrolyte with 0.5mM Co^{2+} at 1.29V. They tried it with CoSO4, Co(NO3)2, and Co(OTf)2 as the cobalt source. It also works on FTO glass, as well as with a NaPi electrolyte.
The description of the processing method is extremely detailed. I would have little difficulty duplicating this experiment. (YIAAS)
> Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof.
No, extraordinary claims require ordinary proof that has been vetted extraordinarily well.
Otherwise, someone can arbitrarily declare claims 'extraordinary' and simply raise the bar every time the proof meets their old standard. You know, like they do with global warming, or evolution.
Sorry, but that soundbyte just gets to me.
The Cobasys example is bullshit. I admire your integrity in agreeing that it's a bullshit example, by citing the fact that they are used in hybrids (although you also lie about them only being in RAV4 EVs), but am puzzled at your inability to reconcile that fact with your lie about it being supressed. So they don't want to sell piddly quantities to shadetree mechanics. So what. They ARE selling to automakers, while you claim they aren't.
Try again.
A large fuel cell stack will cost you around $10 a watt (smaller ones are more expensive per watt). Let's say that some big fuel cell manufacturer and can afford to sell them in bulk for $5 a watt. Well, go check out your breaker box. How many watts is it rated for -- 30kW? 50kW? 100kW? That's hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of fuel cells alone. Not exactly affordable. Even if you were to use a battery or capacitor buffer so that you only need to be able to provide a fraction of that, it's still priced way out of any semblance of affordability. Of course, you don't *have* to use fuel cells. You could use a H2 ICE or turbine. But then your efficiency is *even lower*.
Batteries are really the only realistic option in the foreseeable future.
"He's a god; it'll take more than one shot." â" Lady Eboshi, Mononoke Hime
What are you trying to do, ruin my sex life?
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.