Computational materials design is combined with synthesis and electrochemical characterization to propose nine oxide semiconductors as water-splitting photocatalysts.
Well, it is perhaps not as efficient, but it is more direct, as it does not require large electrical installations to supply the necessary energy. There are also other approaches using bacteria and algae to produce hydrogen. Instead of using solar energy to produce electricity to make hydrogen, these methods use solar energy directly to do so.
Photosynthetic centers have orders of magnitude less conversion efficiency than commercial photovoltaics. Fuel from algae requires photobioreactors to avoid being overgrown by wildtype so prohibitively expensive. Synthetic photochemical systems are all plagued with stability issues. If you separate photovoltaics from electrochemistry you can exchange a degraded part of the system instead of having to discard everything.
A fun fact a lot of people don’t know about is that the light-dependent reaction in photosynthesis is generating hydrogen from water. They then take that hydrogen plus some carbon in the air and process it into sugars as food. The process leaves a little excess oxygen which it ejects. The sugar can then be burnt alongside some oxygen to generate energy and water, effectively undoing the process.
It would be more useful to have cheap, stable and efficient electrocatalysts for hydrogen and oxygen formation reactions each for water electrolysis.
Well, it is perhaps not as efficient, but it is more direct, as it does not require large electrical installations to supply the necessary energy. There are also other approaches using bacteria and algae to produce hydrogen. Instead of using solar energy to produce electricity to make hydrogen, these methods use solar energy directly to do so.
Photosynthetic centers have orders of magnitude less conversion efficiency than commercial photovoltaics. Fuel from algae requires photobioreactors to avoid being overgrown by wildtype so prohibitively expensive. Synthetic photochemical systems are all plagued with stability issues. If you separate photovoltaics from electrochemistry you can exchange a degraded part of the system instead of having to discard everything.
A fun fact a lot of people don’t know about is that the light-dependent reaction in photosynthesis is generating hydrogen from water. They then take that hydrogen plus some carbon in the air and process it into sugars as food. The process leaves a little excess oxygen which it ejects. The sugar can then be burnt alongside some oxygen to generate energy and water, effectively undoing the process.