The use of solar energy to decompose water and produce hydrogen fuel is one of the most promising clean energy technologies being developed. One of the biggest obstacles to it is the discovery of a highly efficient and stable semiconductor material used in the process of water decomposition. Now, a team at Exeter University says it has cleared the barrier. The process of using artificial photosynthesis to decompose water into its constituent hydrogen and oxygen atoms ensures cleanliness and generates 0 carbon emissions, producing more than twice times the energy density of fossil fuels, and when used, the by-product is water.
It will also provide a basic unlimited source of energy. To achieve this goal, the University of Exeter team has established a new optical electrode that absorbs light and triggers electrochemical conversion, using lanthanum, iron and oxygen nanoparticles to extract hydrogen from water.
Its creators claim that the lanthanum oxide semiconductor material is a cheap spray pyrolysis technique, followed by a back fire step, which is the strongest candidate for the generation of renewable hydrogen, because it is stable and low-cost and should be widely used worldwide. Govinder Pawar, the author of the article, said: ' We have shown that our LaFeO3 optical electrodes have the desired band structure for automatic alignment, without external bias, and that our materials have excellent stability and will not degrade after 21 hours of testing, Very suitable for water decomposition purposes. We are working to further improve the material to make it more efficient in producing more hydrogen.
