Efficiency of water electrolysis doubled
Phys.org March 10, 2016
Researchers have boosted the efficiency of water electrolysis. They applied a layer of copper atoms in a conventional platinum electrode. Thus, reaction intermediates could desorb a bit more easily from the catalyst surface. The modified system generated twice the amount of hydrogen than a platinum electrode without a copper layer. The team from the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Technical University in Munich and Universiteit Leiden published these results in the journal Nature Communications.
Together with his team, Wolfgang Schuhmann develops new electrodes, for instance for producing hydrogen. Credit: RUB, Tim Kramer
In the journal Nature Communications, researchers from the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Technical University of Munich and Universiteit Leiden report in what way the efficiency of electrodes can be increased for the purpose of water electrolysis. Typically, platinum is applied as catalyst, in order to accelerate the conversion of water to hydrogen and oxygen. For the reaction to be as efficient as possible, intermediates must not adhere too strongly or too weakly at the catalyst surface...snip
Traditional electrodes bind intermediates too strongly
The team headed by Prof Dr Aliaksandr Bandarenka from the Department of Physics of Energy Conversion and Storage in Munich and Prof Dr Wolfgang Schuhmann from the Center for Electrochemical Sciences in Bochum has calculated how strongly intermediates must adhere to the electrodes, in order to most efficiently facilitate the reaction. The analysis revealed that traditional electrodes from platinum, rhodium and palladium bind the intermediates a bit too strongly.
The researchers modified the properties of the platinum catalyst surface by applying a layer of copper atoms. With this additional layer, the system generated twice the amount of hydrogen than with a pure platinum electrode. But only if the researchers applied the copper layer directly under the top layer of the platinum atoms. The group observed another useful side effect: the copper layer extended the service life of the electrodes, for example by rendering them more corrosion-resistant...snip
Read more:http://phys.org/news/2016-03-efficiency-electrolysis.html
That would make this system twice as efficient
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