A new study conducted by researchers at Brown University has highlighted why platinum is such an efficient catalyst for splitting water molecules to produce hydrogen gas.
The research, published in ACS Catalysis, could help to design new catalysts for producing hydrogen that are cheaper and more plentiful than platinum.
“If we can figure out how to make hydrogen cheaply and efficiently, it opens the door to a lot of pragmatic solutions for fossil-free fuels and chemicals,” said Andrew Peterson, Associate Professor at Brown’s School of Engineering and Co-Author of the study.
“Hydrogen can be used in fuel cells, combined with excess carbon dioxide to make fuel or combined with nitrogen to make ammonia fertiliser. There’s a lot we can do with hydrogen, but to make water splitting a scalable hydrogen source, we need a cheaper catalyst.”
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