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[Due to the increasing size of the archives, each topic page now contains only the prior 365 days of content. Access to older stories is now solely through the Monthly Archive pages or the site search function.]
New Method for Recycling Ammonia Borane for On-Board Hydrogen Storage
September 03, 2009
| Demonstrated off-board regeneration scheme for spent ammonia borane. From Davis et al. 2009. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and the University of Alabama, working within the US Department of Energy’s (DOE) Chemical Hydrogen Storage Center of Excellence, have developed and demonstrated a new method for the efficient off-board recycling of ammonia borane (AB) used in on-board hydrogen storage. A paper describing their work appeared in the journal Angewandte Chemie.
The team discovered that a specific form of dehydrogenated fuel, called polyborazylene (PB), could be recycled with relative ease using modest energy input. This development is a significant step toward using ammonia borane as a possible energy carrier for transportation purposes.
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DOE Announces Details of Initial H-Prize Competition: $1M for Hydrogen Storage
August 31, 2009
The US Department of Energy last week published the details of the Initial H-Prize Competition—a single award for $1 million in the subject area of advanced materials for hydrogen storage in mobile systems for light-duty vehicles. Evaluation of entries will begin in approximately 15 months.
The H-Prize was originally established in Sec. 654 of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (P.L. 110-140) and establishes multiple prize categories, including advancements in technologies, components or systems related to hydrogen production, storage, distribution and utilization; prototypes of hydrogen-powered vehicles or other hydrogen-based products; and transformational changes in technologies for the distribution of production of hydrogen. The original legislation behind the H-Prize was proposed by House Science Research Subcommittee Chairman Bob Inglis in 2006. (Earlier post.)
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New Graphene Nanomaterial Could Result in More Fuel-Efficient Airplanes and Cars; Applications in Energy Storage
July 31, 2009
| Exfoliated Graphite NanoPlatelets. Bottom: lateral and edge views. Source: MSU, XG Sciences. Click to enlarge. |
A Michigan State University (MSU) researcher and his students have developed a nanomaterial—xGnP Exfoliated Graphite NanoPlatelets—that makes plastic stiffer, lighter and stronger and could result in more fuel-efficient airplanes and cars as well as more durable medical and sports equipment and enhanced energy storage systems.
The key to the new material’s capabilities is a fast and inexpensive process for separating layers of graphite (graphene) into stacks less than 10 nanometers in thickness but with lateral dimensions anywhere from 500 nm to tens of microns, coupled with the ability to tailor the particle surface chemistry to make it compatible with water, resin or plastic systems.
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USCAR Argues for Continued US Funding of Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicle Research
July 30, 2009
| Projected hydrogen fuel cell system costs. Click to enlarge. |
The United States Council for Automotive Research (USCAR) recently published a whitepaper on the importance of continued research of hydrogen as a low-carbon transportation solution, in the context of the proposed cutting of hydrogen fuel cell vehicle research in the Department of Energy FY2010 budget. (Earlier post.) The whitepaper is available for download on the USCAR website.
A separate interim report by the National Research Council (NRC) assessing the strategy and structure of the Department of Energy’s FreedomCAR and Fuel Partnership, also published in July, concluded that although the Obama Administration’s focus on nearer-term vehicle technologies to reduce petroleum fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions is on the right track, there remains a need for continued investment in longer-term, higher-risk, higher-payoff vehicle technologies that could be “highly transformational ” with regard to those twin concerns. In addition to advanced batteries, such technologies include systems for hydrogen storage and hydrogen fuel cells, the review panel said. (Earlier post.)
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Interim Report from National Research Council Urges DOE to Continue Support of Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicle Research
July 23, 2009
An interim report by the National Research Council (NRC) assessing the strategy and structure of the Department of Energy’s FreedomCAR and Fuel Partnership concluded that although the Obama Administration’s focus on nearer-term vehicle technologies to reduce petroleum fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions is on the right track, there remains a need for continued investment in longer-term, higher-risk, higher-payoff vehicle technologies that could be “highly transformational” with regard to those twin concerns.
In addition to advanced batteries, such technologies include systems for hydrogen storage and hydrogen fuel cells, the review panel said. The report comes in the context of the proposed zeroing-out of hydrogen fuel cell vehicle research funding in the DOE’s proposed FY 2010 budget. (Earlier post.)
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Australian Researchers Propose New MOF-based Concept for H2 and Methane Storage
July 20, 2009
| Schematic representation for proposed material Mg-C60@MOF showing a MOF cavity impregnated with magnesium-decorated C60. Credit: ACS. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers in Australia have proposed a new concept for hydrogen and methane storage materials involving the incorporation of magnesium-decorated fullerenes within metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). According to their modeling, the magnesium-decorated Mg10C60 fullerenes show a volumetric methane uptake of 265 v/v, the highest reported value for any material, which significantly exceeds the US Department of Energy target of 180 v/v.
They also predict a very high hydrogen adsorption enthalpy of 11 kJ mol-1 with relatively little decrease as a function of H2 filling. This value is close to the calculated optimum value of 15.1 kJ mol-1 and is achieved concurrently with saturation hydrogen uptake in large amounts at pressures under 10 atm.
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Proterra Fuel Cell Hybrid Bus in DoD Hydrogen Energy Cycle Pilot Project
July 11, 2009
Colorado-based Proterra LLC, a manufacturer of electric drive commercial transportation solutions (battery-electric and range-extended EVs) from city transit buses to class 4-8 trucks (earlier post), will provide a hydrogen fuel cell hybrid bus (earlier post) for use a US Department of Defense (DoD) pilot project designed to test an end-to-end clean hydrogen energy cycle.
Led by the Center for Transportation and the Environment (CTE), the pilot project will include all elements of a clean hydrogen energy cycle, including local hydrogen generation via waste water treatment digester gas cleanup and reformation; bulk hydrogen storage, transport and dispensing; and hydrogen load in the form of 19 fuel-cell powered electric forklifts and Proterra’s fuel cell powered bus.
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AIST Researchers Propose Hydrous Hydrazine for On-Board Hydrogen Storage
July 07, 2009
| Time-course plots for the decomposition of hydrazine in aqueous solutions in the presence of different metal nanoparticles. The inset shows a TEM image of Rh(0) NPs and the corresponding SAED (selected area electron diffraction) pattern. Credit: ACS. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers at Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) have found that found that Rhodium (Rh) nanoparticles (NPs) are highly active for catalytic decomposition of hydrous hydrazine to generate hydrogen and nitrogen under aqueous and ambient reaction conditions.
Their results, wrote the researchers in a paper published online in the ACS Journal of the American Chemical Society, offer a new prospect for an on-board hydrogen storage system. The team is currently working on improving the catalytic activity and selectivity.
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Researchers Demonstrate Electrochemical Route for Reversible Generation of Aluminum Hydride for Hydrogen Storage
July 06, 2009
| Reversible cycle for aluminum hydride. All components of the electrochemical process can be recycled to continually afford a viable solid-state storage material. Source: SRNL. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers at the US Department of Energy’s Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) have demonstrated a reversible electrochemical route to generate aluminum hydride (alane, AlH3), a high-capacity hydrogen storage material. A paper on their work appeared in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Chemical Communications.
Aluminum hydride is one of the promising bulk materials still under investigation at the US Department of Energy’s Metal Hydride Center of Excellence (MHCoE, based at SRNL) following the downselection of a number of other potential materials over the past year, according to a presentation given by MHCoE director Lennie Klebanoff at the recent 2009 DOE Merit Review.
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European Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Technology Initiative Launches €140M Call for Proposals
July 03, 2009
The European Fuel Cells and Hydrogen (FCH) Joint Technology Initiative (JTI) has issued a second call for proposals for research. Around €140 million (US$196 million) has been allocated to this second call, with €71.3 million by the Commission matched by in-kind contributions of the industrial partners. The FCH JTI, an EU-wide collaborative private-public partnership, has a total budget amounts around €1 billion (US$1.4 billion) to be invested in hydrogen and fuel cell research and development by 2014. (Earlier post.)
The 29 project topics in the second call aim to put fuel cell and hydrogen energy technologies on the market two to five years sooner than what is estimated without the support the JTI offers. Selected teams of researchers will investigate bottlenecks in the whole range of applications for these energy technologies, from cars to large scale power plants, as well as the whole supply chain from hydrogen production to demonstration of the market-readiness of applications.
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Material Derived From Carbonized Chicken Feathers Could Meet DOE Hydrogen Storage Targets
June 23, 2009
Scientists at the University of Delaware are developing a new low-cost material for hydrogen storage—carbonized chicken feathers (CCFF)—that they say could meet the DOE requirements for hydrogen storage and are competitive with carbon nanotubes and metal hydrates at a tiny fraction of their cost. Their research was presented at ACS Green Chemistry Institute’s 13th Annual Green Chemistry & Engineering Conference on 23 June.
The Department of Energy’s (DOE) 2010 and 2015 hydrogen storage targets are 6 wt% and 9 wt% (gravimetric capacity); 45 and 81 grams H2 per L (volumetric capacity); and $4 and $2 per kWh (storage cost), respectively.
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California Air Resources Board Pushes for Restoration of DOE Funding for Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicles; Tackles the “Four Miracles”
June 19, 2009
California Air Resources Board Chairman Mary Nichols met with US Energy Secretary Steven Chu in May and followed up that meeting with a letter, urging the continuation of funding to support research, development and deployment of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. Nichols is also requesting a follow-on meeting between ARB technical staff, DOE technical staff and the several automakers pursuing fuel cell vehicles to continue the “dialog and investigation”.
The Obama Administration’s 2010 Department of Energy (DOE) budget proposes cutting the federal hydrogen fuel cell research and deployment budget by more than two-thirds ($130 million), eliminating funds for the hydrogen fuel cell vehicle program and market transformation programs. (Earlier post.)
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COFs Among the Best Adsorbents for Storage of Hydrogen, Natural Gas and CO2
June 07, 2009
| High-pressure CH4 isotherms for COFs measured at 298 K. Credit: ACS. Click to enlarge. |
COFs (covalent organic frameworks)—thermally stable and highly functional crystalline organic networks—are among the most porous and the best adsorbents for hydrogen, methane, and carbon dioxide, according to a new study by Professor Omar Yaghi and postdoc Hiroyasu Furukawa at the Center for Reticular Chemistry at UCLA. A paper on their findings was published online 4 June in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
Yaghi and his colleagues have been at the forefront of inventing new classes of crystalline porous materials: metal organic frameworks (MOFs), and then COFs, reported in the journal Science in 2007. (Earlier post.)
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Researchers Improve Performance of Ammonia Borane as Hydrogen Storage Material
May 10, 2009
| Hydrogen release measurements at 59 °C on the pristine, 2.0 mol% Co-doped, and 2.0 mol% Ni-doped AB samples. Credit: ACS. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers at the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics in China and the National University of Singapore have improved the performance of ammonia borane (AB) as a material for hydrogen storage—potentially for on-board storage in a vehicle—by developing a new method for doping AB with nanosized Co- and Ni-based catalysts.
Experimental results showed that the catalyst-doped AB samples can release approximately 5.8 wt% H2 at a temperature as low as 59 °C. Moreover, the dehydrogenation does not bring any detectable borazine or foaming.
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Sandia Successfully Completes Hydrogen Storage System for GM
May 08, 2009
| The hydrogen storage system Sandia designed for GM. To the right is the “SmartBed,” featuring a thermal management system with individual control of four identical modules, each of which is a shell and tube heat exchanger. The sodium alanate material used to store the hydrogen resides within the tubes. (Photo by Randy Wong) Click to enlarge. |
Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have successfully designed and demonstrated key features of a hydrogen storage system that utilizes a complex metal hydride material—sodium alanate. The system, developed through a multiyear project funded by General Motors Corp., stores 3 kilograms of hydrogen and is large enough to evaluate control strategies suitable for use in vehicle applications. (Earlier post.)
Sandia researchers point out that the system was not meant to fit on board a vehicle, and that sodium alanate will not be the material of choice for onboard storage of hydrogen. But, although it is indeed larger and heavier than a viable automotive storage system requires, the system’s engineered elements address many of the thermal management issues that are necessary for successful vehicular storage of hydrogen.
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Researchers Show Carbon Nanostructures Can Function as Catalysts for Solid-State Hydrogen Storage
March 15, 2009
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| Screening study results of NaAlH4/carbon mixtures. Sample key: (a) 8 nm CNT, (b) 10-20 nm CNT, (c) 10-20 nm CNT with 4 mol % Ti, (d) 50 nm CNT, (e) graphite, (f) C60[1] (g) C60[2] (h) C60[3], (i) control no carbon, ball mill 4 mol % TiCl3, and (j) control no carbon or Ti. Two pressures used for the rehydriding step (which affects the amount of hydrogen desorbed in the second cycle) are highlighted by color: high pressure experiments are blue; lower pressure experiments are red. Credit: ACS. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers from the US and Sweden have shown that carbon nanostructures (fullerenes, nanotubes, and graphene) can be used as catalysts for hydrogen uptake and release in complex metal hydrides such as sodium alanate (NaAlH4) and also developed what they characterize as an “unambiguous understanding” of how such catalysts work.
The researchers from Savannah River National Laboratory and Virginia Commonwealth University in the US and Uppsala University and the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden set out to understand the mechanism behind the catalytic effects of carbon nanomaterials, specifically on the example of sodium alanate, which is a popular material for hydrogen storage studies. The results of their work, which combined experimental and theoretical efforts, were published online 3 March in the ACS journal Nano Letters.
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New Nanoporous Material Has Highest Surface Area Yet
March 09, 2009
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| UMCM-2 is a coordination polymer comprising three different types of cages. Credit: ACS. Click to enlarge. |
Researchers at the University of Michigan (U-M) have developed a new nanoporous material with a surface area of more than 5,000 square meters per gram—significantly higher than that of any other porous material reported to date.
The work, by a team led by associate professor of chemistry Adam Matzger, is described in a paper published online 6 March in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
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New MOF Material With Hydrogen Uptake Of Up To 10 wt%
February 22, 2009
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| Different cages in the crystal structure of NOTT-112. The network in NOTT-112 is constructed by the packing of Cage A, Cage B and Cage C in the ratio of 1:2:1, respectively. Yan et al. (2009). Click to enlarge. |
Researchers at the University of Nottingham (UK), with participation from General Motors’s Chemical and Environmental Sciences Laboratory in Warren, Michigan, have developed a new metal–organic polyhedral framework that shows an excess hydrogen uptake of 7.07 wt% between 35 and 40 bar at 77 K (508-580 psi at -196 °C) and a total hydrogen uptake of 10 wt% at 77 bar (1,117 psi) and 77 K. An open-access paper on their work appears in the RSC journal Chemical Communications.
Metal-organic framework (MOF) compounds, consisting of metal-oxide clusters connected by organic linkers, are nano-porous materials that show promise for hydrogen storage applications because of their tunable pore size and functionality. (Earlier post.) MOFS were initially explored as mechanisms for simple hydrogen adsorption at nonmetal sites. However, researchers have found that enabling the direct binding of hydrogen to open metal coordination sites in MOFs allows the hydrogen molecules to pack together more closely and can provide a major boost in storage capacity. (Earlier post.)
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US DOE Issues Request for Information on Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Market Development; Reports to Congress on Program
February 05, 2009
The US Department of Energy (DOE) Hydrogen Program has issued a Request for Information (RFI) on potential early markets and deployment opportunities for hydrogen and fuel cells. The information gathered is intended to help DOE to identify key early markets, validate hydrogen and fuel cell system performance through data collection and communicate results, cultivate demand and accelerate market development, and reduce non-technical barriers that hinder market penetration.
At the end of January, DOE also issued the Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Activities, Progress, and Plans Report to Congress as required by the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT). Among its findings, the report notes that in DOE’s assessment, “although significant progress has been made”, fuel cell cost is still too high and durability still too low to enable industry to meet the deployment goal of 100,000 hydrogen-fueled vehicles by 2010, as specified in EPACT.
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EERE Hydrogen Program Issues RFI on Formation of New Centers of Excellence for R&D of Hydrogen-Storage Materials
January 20, 2009
The US The Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) Hydrogen, Fuel Cells and Infrastructure Technologies Program issued a Request for Information (RFI) on the formation of new Centers of Excellence for the research and development of hydrogen storage materials. The on-board vehicle storage of hydrogen continues to be one of the most technically challenging barriers to the widespread commercialization of hydrogen-fueled light-duty vehicles.
The EERE hydrogen storage activity focuses primarily on the applied research and development (R&D) of low-pressure, materials-based technologies to allow for a driving range of more than 300 miles (500 km) while meeting packaging, cost, safety, and performance requirements to be competitive with current vehicles. While automakers have recently demonstrated progress with some prototype vehicles traveling more than 300 miles on a single fill, this driving range must be achievable across different vehicle models and without compromising space, performance or cost, the EERE says.
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US Fuel Cell Council Pushes Congress for $1.17B for Hydrogen, Fuel Cell and Infrastructure Programs
December 30, 2008
The US Fuel Cell Council (USFCC), an industry association formed to foster the commercialization of fuel cells in the United State, is asking Congress to put $1.17 billion into fuel cells, hydrogen and infrastructure.
Fully funding programs of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT) at levels Congress has already approved for FY2010, and use of other authorized funds, would account for the $1.17 billion. The US Fuel Cell Council would like to see the money applied in six basic areas: deployment programs; development of a refueling infrastructure; learning demonstrations; building domestic manufacturing capability; accelerating public-private research; and investing in fuel cell transit programs.
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Researchers Engineer Carbon Nanotube Scaffolds for Higher Density Hydrogen Storage
December 24, 2008
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| The procedure expands the geometry of a SWCNT fiber (upper left) and then locks the expanded form into a stable shape with cross linkers (bottom). Click to enlarge. Credit: ACS |
Researchers at Rice University and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have engineered single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) fibers to become a scaffold for the storage of hydrogen. The 3-D nanoengineered fibers physisorb twice as much hydrogen per unit surface area as do typical macroporous carbon materials.
These fiber-based systems can have high density, and combined with the outstanding thermal conductivity of carbon nanotubes, can point a way toward solving the volumetric and heat-transfer constraints that limit some other hydrogen-storage supports, the team writes in a paper published online 22 December in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
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Europe Launches Major Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Push with €1B JTI
October 15, 2008
Representatives of industry, the research community and the European institutions launched the €1 billion (US$1.357 billion) Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Joint Technology Initiative (JTI) (earlier post) at an event in Brussels, Belgium on 14 October.
Over the next six years, the European Commission and industry will invest almost €500 million each into the initiative, with the aim of accelerating the development of hydrogen and fuel cell technologies and bringing them to the market by 2020. The EC estimates that the JTI’s activities will reduce the time to market for these technologies by two to five years.
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DOE Awards $1.9M Grant for Study of High-Density, Lower-Pressure Adsorbed Hydrogen Storage Tanks from Corncobs
October 10, 2008
The US Department of Energy (DOE) recently awarded a $1.9 million grant to researchers at the University of Missouri (MU) and Midwest Research Institute (MRI) to continue developing a high-density, lower-pressure nanoporous biocarbon hydrogen storage system derived from corncobs.
Peter Pfeifer, professor and chair of the Department of Physics at MU will work with M. Frederick Hawthorne, professor of radiology, chemistry and physics and director of the MU International Institute for Nano and Molecular Medicine; Carlos Wexler, associate professor of physics; Galen Suppes, professor of chemical engineering; and researchers at MRI in Kansas City to develop the hydrogen storage material.
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New Pillared Graphene Material Offers Enhanced Hydrogen Storage; Close to DOE Target
October 01, 2008
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| Volumetric hydrogen uptake for graphene (diamonds), (6,6) carbon nanotubes (squares), pillared material (triangles), and Li-doped pillared (stars) at (a) 77 K and (b) 300 K. Click to enlarge. Credit: ACS |
Researchers at the University of Crete (Greece) have designed a novel 3-D network nanostructure that almost meets the US Department of Energy (DOE) 2010 volumetric goals for hydrogen storage. The new pillared graphene material could theoretically store up to 41 grams of hydrogen per liter under ambient conditions; the DOE’s target is 45 g/L. Their study is scheduled for the 8 October issue of the ACS journal Nano Letters.
Georgios K. Dimitrakakis, Emmanuel Tylianakis, and George E. Froudakis designed a unique structure consisting of parallel graphene sheets—layers of carbon just one atom thick—stabilized by vertical columns of carbon nanotubes (CNTs). The nanoporous material has by design tunable pore sizes and surface areas. They also doped the material with lithium to enhance the storage capacity.
