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Decarbonising Energy: the Developing International Activity in Hydrogen Technologies and Fuel Cells

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Decarbonising Energy: the Developing International Activity in Hydrogen Technologies and Fuel Cells Journal of Energy Chemistry 0 0 0 (2020) 1–11 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Energy Chemistry journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jechem Review Decarbonising energy: The developing international activity in hydrogen technologies and fuel cells ∗ John Meurig Thomas a, Peter P. Edwards b, , Peter J. Dobson c, Gari P. Owen d a Department of Materials Science & Metallurgy, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB3 0FS, UK b King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST)-Oxford Centre of Excellence in Petrochemicals and Inorganic Chemistry Laboratory, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3QR, UK c The Queen’s College, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 4AW, UK d Annwvyn Solutions (Independent Consultant), Bromley, Kent BR1 3DW, UK a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: Hydrogen technologies and fuel cells offer an alternative and improved solution for a decarbonised energy Received 11 February 2020 future. Fuel cells are electrochemical converters; transforming hydrogen (or energy sources containing hy- Revised 31 March 2020 drogen) and oxygen directly into electricity and heat. The hydrogen fuel cell, invented in 1839, permits Accepted 31 March 2020 the generation of electrical energy with a high efficiency through a non-combustion, electrochemical pro- Available online xxx cess and, importantly, without the emission of CO 2 at its point of use. Hitherto, despite numerous efforts Keywords: to exploit the obvious attractions of hydrogen technologies and hydrogen fuel cells, various challenges Decarbonisation have been encountered, some of which are reviewed here. Now, however, given the exigent need to ur- Hydrogen Energy gently seek low-carbon paths for humankind’s energy future, numerous countries are advancing the de- Hydrogen Economy ployment of hydrogen technologies and hydrogen fuel cells not only for transport, but also as a means of Fuel cells the storage of excess energy from, for example, wind and solar farms. Furthermore, hydrogen is also be- Environment ing blended into the natural gas used in domestic heating and targeted in the decarbonisation of critical, Sustainability large-scale industrial processes such as steel making. We briefly review specific examples in countries such as Japan, South Korea and the People’s Republic of China, as well as selected examples from Europe and North America in the utilization of hydrogen technologies and hydrogen fuel cells. ©2020 Science Press and Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. and Science Press. All rights reserved. Sir John Meurig Thomas is one of the founders of solid- Peter P. Edwards FRS ML holds the Statutory Chair of state chemistry and the surface and materials chemistry Inorganic Chemistry at Oxford and is the Co-Director of of solids. He was one of the first chemists in the world to the KACST-Oxford Centre of Excellence in Petrochemicals, use electron microscopy as a chemical tool, which he ini- also at Oxford. He has previously held positions at Birm- tiated in the University of Wales (Bangor) in 1964. He has ingham (Professor of Chemistry and of Materials), Cam- made numerous studies in heterogeneous catalysis and bridge (Lecturer in Chemistry and Director of Studies in made significant contributions to the study of minerals, Chemistry, Jesus College) and Cornell (British Fulbright especially silicates, zeolites and clays as well as graphite Scholar and National Science Foundation Fellow). He was and diamond. For his contributions to geochemistry, a Co-Founder of the first-ever UK Interdisciplinary Research new mineral, Meurigite, was named in his honour. He Centre, that in Superconductivity at Cambridge and the was once head of Physical Chemistry in the University of UK Sustainable Hydrogen Energy Consortium (UKSHEC). Cambridge and Director of the Royal Institution of Great He has been Chair of the European Research Council Ad- Britain. vanced Investigators Award Panel on Chemical Synthesis and Advanced Materials. Edwards is Fellow of the Royal Society; Einstein Professor of the Chinese Academy of Sciences; Member, German Academy of Sciences, Inter- national Honorary Member of the US Academy of Arts and Sciences; International Member of the American Philosophical Society, and Member of the Academia Eu- ropaea. His current major interests include: Targeted reconstruction of plastic waste to hydrogen and starting monomers; converting carbon dioxide to carbon-neutral fuels and Green hydrogen from fossil hydrocarbon fuels. ∗ Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (P.P. Edwards). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jechem.2020.03.087 2095-4956/© 2020 Science Press and Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. and Science Press. All rights reserved. 2 J.M. Thomas, P.P. Edwards and P.J. Dobson et al. / Journal of Energy Chemistry 0 0 0 (2020) 1–11 Peter Dobson covers a wide range of disciplines from Box 1 . HYDROGEN TECHNOLOGY: THE NEW LOGISTICS physics and chemistry to materials science and engineer- ing. He has also worked in industry (Philips) as well as academia (Imperial College and Oxford) and was re- Over recent years there has been a trend for an increasing sponsible for creating and building The Begbroke Sci- amount of on-line shopping with major debates about the ence Park for Oxford University. He has published over 180 papers and 33 patents. He has founded 4 companies social implications of this on communities. Intuitively, this and advised on the formation of 8 more. He was (2009- leads to fewer private car journeys although discussion with 2013) the Strategic Advisor on Nanotechnology to the Re- transport officials reveals that this is a more complex situa- search Councils in the UK and currently sits on the EPSRC tion than it appears in view of increased deliveries. Neverthe- Strategic Advisory Board on Quantum Technology. He was less, there is an increase in distribution centres and this pro- awarded the OBE in 2013 in recognition of his contribu- vides a real world example of a use case for a fuel cell pow- tions to science and engineering. He is a Visiting Profes- sor at King’s College London and at UCL. Peter delivers courses at Graduate level in ered vehicles –thefork lift truck for moving goods within the areas of healthcare, biosensors, energy, nanotechnology, manufacturing, innova- the distribution centre and the use of uncrewed air vehicles tion, entrepreneurship and related topics and advises companies and inventors on (UAVs) for “last mile” home deliveries. innovation. Already, there are 25,0 0 0 fuel cell powered fork lift trucks in use in the US [3] . Amazon is investing in this technology [ 4 , 5 ]. Amazon Prime Air is expected to start a drone deliv- Gari Owen was educated at the University of Wales ery service in selected cities by the end of 2019 [6] . There (1967-1973) and worked for 30 years in Government are proposals [7] by several suppliers for hydrogen fuel cell (Home Office and Ministry of Defence) in research and powered drones for this purpose on the argument that these development, international programmes and identifying UAVs typically have 3 times the radius (9 times the area cov- new requirements. Since 2003, he has been a Consultant to Government and Industry in the fields of defence, se- erage) of an equivalent battery operated vehicle. curity and future technologies. He has also served as an This is an example of how a change in societal behaviour adviser and stakeholder on various EC (FP7 & H2020) pro- leads to the adoption of technology for both technical and grammes. commercial reasons in an unforeseen way. 2. Historical background 1. Introduction Fuel cells are electrochemical converters, transforming hydro- Numerous countries across the world are now urgently en- gen (or hydrogen-containing fuel feedstocks) and oxygen directly, gaged in seeking ways of securing a low-carbon or decarbonised with high efficiency, into electricity and heat with only water as energy future for humankind. In particular, the merits of moving the emission product at their point-of-use. The electrochemical away from vehicles powered by fossil fuel internal combustion en- cell is one in which the free energy of combustion of a chemi- gines towards battery-operated vehicles are being strongly advo- cal fuel is directly converted into electrical energy – remarkably, cated and enthusiastically implemented [1] . without the aerial combustion process and the concomitant emis- In a major study, the US National Academy of Sciences has ad- sion of CO2 . The notion of a fuel cell goes back to the invention dressed many of the challenges of achieving a future dominated by by William R. Grove, a lawyer and amateur electrochemist [ 8 , 9 ]. carbon-free energy [2] . Grove used two platinum electrodes dipping into an electrolyte, In this article we highlight here several vignettes that reflect a at one of which hydrogen underwent the following catalytic re- → → + + − complementary approach; namely, the implementation across the action: 2H2 4H (ads) 4H 4e ; and at the other, the reac- + + + − → globe of hydrogen energy technologies and hydrogen fuel cells as tion: O2 4H 4e 2H2 O. The overall process is then simply: + → a route to the effective decarbonisation of transport, energy and 2H2 O2 2H2 O but with a generated electric current now flow- manufacturing. Our aim is to demonstrate that commendable tech- ing into an external circuit. Grove himself regarded his invention as nological solutions in this area are currently being implemented to a gas cell. And in a famous letter that he wrote to Michael Faraday help redress the adverse environmental effects of our carbon-based in 1842, he described it as a “curious voltaic pile” (see Fig. 1 ). energy sector. We are convinced that the prospects of hydrogen as A useful summary of the different types of fuel cells that have an energy carrier or vector will, if appropriately implemented, ulti- since been developed has been produced by the US Department mately help humankind towards our goal of a low- or zero- carbon of Energy [10] , and a typical widely-used fuel cell is the so-called energy future.
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