Mixing Waste Products with Steam to Release Hydrogen
11 July 2009 | Alternative Energy | No Comments
Hydrogen is one of the elements that could replace fossil fuels in the near future, but still there is a problem in extracting hydrogen because of rised costs.With classical methods of obtaining hydrogen is generated a large amount of greenhouse gases emitted, which are not good for the environment. A cleaner way to obtain hydrogen was performed at Leeds, and it consists in mixing waste products with steam to release hydrogen.Aceasta method proved to be much cheaper and does not pollute the environment.
Researchers from University of Leeds believe that future cars and laptops will be powered by their environmentally-friendly hydrogen obtained from waste materials,vegetable oil or glycerol(bio-diesel by product). They think that this type of energy could be used even on small, portable devices such as laptops and cell phones.
“It’s becoming increasingly necessary for scientists devising new technologies to limit the amount of carbon dioxide they release. This project takes us one step closer to these goals – once we have technologies that enable us to produce hydrogen sustainably, the infrastructure to support its use will grow…We firmly believe that these advanced steam reforming processes have great potential for helping to build the hydrogen economy. Our primary focus now is to ensure the materials we rely on – both to catalyse the desired reaction and to capture the carbon dioxide – can be used over and over again without losing their efficacy.” – Dr Valerie Dupont from SPEME(the School of Process, Environmental and Materials Engineering), said.
“A hydrocarbon-based fuel from plant or waste sources is mixed with steam in a catalytic reactor, generating hydrogen and carbon dioxide along with excess water. The water is then easily condensed by cooling and the carbon dioxide is removed in-situ by a solid sorbent material.” – Sciencedaily
Tags: catalytic reactor, environmentally-friendly hydrogen, extracting hydrogen, glycerol, greenhouse gases, hydrocarbon-based fuel, hydrogen, hydrogen economy, hydrogen sustainably, obtaining hydrogen, release hydrogen, replace fossil fuels, SPEME, University of Leeds, Valerie Dupont, vegetable oil, waste materials