"New process of hydrogen fuel preparation": nature reports a major breakthrough in China's catalytic hydrogen production research

Hydrogen energy is known as the next generation of secondary clean energy, but the storage and transportation of hydrogen has been the bottleneck of large-scale application of hydrogen energy In particular, hydrogen fuel cell is the most potential new generation of energy supply system It can efficiently convert chemical energy into electrical energy, and is widely used in aerospace, automobile and other fixed and mobile energy supply systems However, the chemical properties of hydrogen are active, and the storage of hydrogen becomes the key to the application of hydrogen fuel cell At present, Toyota's commercial hydrogen fuel cell vehicle solution is to use cylinders with a capacity of about 120L and a pressure of up to 700kg for hydrogen storage, but its safety is not optimistic, and there are certain hidden dangers in the urban hydrogenation infrastructure construction In addition, other hydrogen storage systems are expensive or have limited storage capacity In order to solve these problems, one possible solution is to store hydrogen in liquid methanol Hydrogen is produced in situ by liquid-phase reforming reaction of water and methanol for fuel cell use When hydrogen stored in methanol is released, it also activates equimolar water to release additional hydrogen gas Recently, the Martin group of School of chemistry and molecular engineering of Peking University, together with Zhou Wu of University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wen Xiaodong of Shanxi Institute of coal and chemical technology / Zhongke synthetic oil of Chinese Academy of Sciences and Shichuan of Dalian University of technology, developed and exhibited a new platinum molybdenum carbide bifunctional catalyst for hydrogen production from methanol and water at low temperature (150-190 ℃) ）High hydrogen production efficiency was obtained There is a strong interaction between Pt and MOC substrate, which makes Pt disperse on the surface of MOC nanoparticles at the atomic level and build a high-density catalytic activity center at the atomic scale The activation of water takes place in the center of molybdenum carbide, while the activation of methanol takes place in the center of platinum The synergism between the highly dispersed Pt center at the atomic level and the molybdenum carbide substrate can realize the efficient activation of the reaction intermediates at the interface between the two, so that the whole catalyst shows super high hydrogen production activity in the liquid-phase reaction of methanol and water, which can be achieved by 2 at 150 ℃, The reaction rate of 276 mol H2 / (mol Pt * h) releases hydrogen, and further increases the temperature to 190 ℃, and the hydrogen release rate can reach 18046 mol H2 / (mol Pt * h), which is two orders of magnitude higher than the activity of traditional platinum based catalysts At the same time, the characteristics of atom level dispersion can maximize the utilization rate of precious metal platinum Based on the estimation of hydrogen production activity, only the catalyst containing 6 g of platinum can make the hydrogen production rate reach 1 kg H2 / h, which basically meets the needs of commercial vehicle fuel cell banks Based on the current market price of methanol (2400 yuan / ton), the hydrogen storage and release technology is adopted The fuel price of hydrogen fuel cell vehicle per 100 kilometers is only about 13 yuan, and 60-80 liters of methanol can be used to drive 600-1000 kilometers for a family car In this work, a new chemical high-efficiency hydrogen storage and desorption system has been constructed, which provides a new idea for in-situ hydrogen supply of fuel cells, and is expected to be applied as the next generation of high-efficiency hydrogen storage and desorption system The research results were published on nature on March 23, 2017 under the title of "low temperature hydrogen production from water and metal using Pt / α - MOC catalysts" (DOI: 10.1038 / nature21672) Schematic diagram of methanol and water catalytic hydrogen production, source: C & E news magazine of American Chemical Society reported the work with the title of "hydrogen energy: new process for generating hydrogen fuel" Professor Dion vlachos, director of the energy center of the University of Delaware, commented that the new process "is at the forefront of technology in terms of reaction performance", while Professor Matthias Beller, director of Leibniz catalysis Institute in Germany, believed that the catalytic system was a major breakthrough (Beller calls Ma's catalyst "a major breakthrough") This kind of catalyst is also expected to play a dominant role in other water phase reforming hydrogen production processes, such as domestic wastewater, ethanol and other raw materials.