Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-28T04:12:50.731Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Recent advances and demonstrated potentials for clean hydrogen via overall solar water splitting

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2019

Faqrul A. Chowdhury Open the ORCID record for Faqrul A. Chowdhury [Opens in a new window]
Faqrul A. Chowdhury*
Affiliation:
Department of Physics, McGill University, 3600University Street, Montreal, Québec H3A 2T8, Canada Department of ECE, McGill University, 3480University Street, Montreal, Québec H3A 0E9, Canada.
*
*(Email: mohammad.chowdhury2@mail.mcgill.ca)
Get access

Abstract

Solar water splitting can potentially play a significant role in the future, sustainable and carbon-neutral energy infrastructure - by generating hydrogen as a green fuel from renewable sources and liquid-fuels via carbon-dioxide reduction. Hydrogen has higher gravimetric energy-yield compared to most of the conventional fossil fuels, is storable and transportable on demand. With the prospective green hydrogen economy in mind, considerable efforts have been made in the quest for a stable and efficient photocatalyst/photoelectrode which can eventually lead towards the realization of large-scale hydrogen production system. This snapshot review provides a summary of the basic principles and challenges associated with unassisted overall water splitting, and highlights the recent technological advancements made on the device and system designs on lab-scale - to improve different performance metrics, i.e., efficiency, stability, scalability and large-scale prototypes with demonstrated potentials for future developments.

Keywords

sustainabilityenergy storagenanostructurephotochemicalenvironmentally benign
Type
Review Article
Information
MRS Advances , Volume 4 , Issue 51-52: Snapshot reviews in Materials Advances 2019 , 2019 , pp. 2771 - 2785
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References:

Turner, J. A., "Sustainable Hydrogen Production," Science 305, 972 (2004).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lewis, N. S. and Nocera, D. G., "Powering the planet: Chemical challenges in solar energy utilization," Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 103, 15729-15735 (2006).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tachibana, Y., Vayssieres, L., and Durrant, J. R., "Artificial photosynthesis for solar water-splitting," Nat. Photonics 6, 511-518 (2012).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fujishima, A. and Honda, K., "Electrochemical Photolysis of Water at a Semiconductor Electrode," Nature 238, 37-38 (1972).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kudo, A. and Miseki, Y., "Heterogeneous photocatalyst materials for water splitting," Chem. Soc. Rev. 38, 253-278 (2009).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Osterloh, F. E., "Inorganic Materials as Catalysts for Photochemical Splitting of Water," Chem. Mater. 20, 35-54 (2008).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chen, X., Shen, S., Guo, L., and Mao, S. S., "Semiconductor-based Photocatalytic Hydrogen Generation," Chem. Rev. 110, 6503-6570 (2010).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Liu, J. et al. , "Metal-free efficient photocatalyst for stable visible water splitting via a two-electron pathway," Science 347, 970 (2015).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, Q. et al. , "Scalable water splitting on particulate photocatalyst sheets with a solar-to-hydrogen energy conversion efficiency exceeding 1%," Nat. Mater. 15, 611 (2016).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Liu, H., Yuan, J., Jiang, Z., Shangguan, W. F., Einaga, H., and Teraoka, Y., "Novel photocatalyst of V-based solid solutions for overall water splitting,", J. Mater. Chem. 21, 16535-16543 (2011).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liao, L. et al. , "Efficient solar water-splitting using a nanocrystalline CoO photocatalyst," Nat. Nanotechnol. 9, 69 (2013).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chowdhury, F. A., Mi, Z., Kibria, M. G., and Trudeau, M. L., "Group III-nitride nanowire structures for photocatalytic hydrogen evolution under visible light irradiation," APL Mater. 3, 104408 (2015).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nozik, A. J., "p‐n photoelectrolysis cells," Appl. Phys. Lett. 29, 150-153 (1976).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kubacka, A., Fernández-García, M., and Colón, G., "Advanced Nanoarchitectures for Solar Photocatalytic Applications," Chem. Rev. 112, 1555-1614 (2012).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tong, H., Ouyang, S., Bi, Y., Umezawa, N., Oshikiri, M., and Ye, J., "Nano-photocatalytic Materials: Possibilities and Challenges," Adv. Mater. 24, 229-251 (2012).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wang, Q. et al. , "Particulate Photocatalyst Sheets Based on Carbon Conductor Layer for Efficient Z-Scheme Pure-Water Splitting at Ambient Pressure," J. Am. Chem. Soc. 139, 1675-1683 (2017).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Reece, S. Y. et al. , "Wireless Solar Water Splitting Using Silicon-Based Semiconductors and Earth-Abundant Catalysts," Science 334, 645 (2011).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nocera, D. G., "The Artificial Leaf," Acc. Chem. Res. 45, 767-776 (2012).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kim, J. H. et al. , "Wireless Solar Water Splitting Device with Robust Cobalt-Catalyzed, Dual-Doped BiVO4 Photoanode and Perovskite Solar Cell in Tandem: A Dual Absorber Artificial Leaf," ACS Nano 9, 11820-11829 (2015).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Yeh, T.-F., Teng, C.-Y., Chen, S.-J., and Teng, H., "Nitrogen-Doped Graphene Oxide Quantum Dots as Photocatalysts for Overall Water-Splitting under Visible Light Illumination," Adv. Mater. 26, 3297-3303 (2014).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tian, B. et al. , "Supported black phosphorus nanosheets as hydrogen-evolving photocatalyst achieving 5.4% energy conversion efficiency at 353 K," Nat. Commun. 9, 1397 (2018).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kibria, M. G. et al. , "Visible light-driven efficient overall water splitting using p-type metal-nitride nanowire arrays," Nat. Commun. 6, 6797 (2015).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Guan, X. and Chowdhury, F. A. et al. , "Making of an Industry-Friendly Artificial Photosynthesis Device," ACS Energy Lett. 3, 2230-2231 (2018).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chowdhury, F. A., Trudeau, M. L., Guo, H., and Mi, Z., "A photochemical diode artificial photosynthesis system for unassisted high efficiency overall pure water splitting," Nat. Commun. 9, 1707 (2018).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Liu, C., Tang, J., Chen, H. M., Liu, B., and Yang, P., "A Fully Integrated Nanosystem of Semiconductor Nanowires for Direct Solar Water Splitting," Nano Lett. 13, 2989-2992 (2013).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Su, J., Wei, Y., and Vayssieres, L., "Stability and Performance of Sulfide-, Nitride-, and Phosphide-Based Electrodes for Photocatalytic Solar Water Splitting," J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 8, 5228-5238 (2017).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lee, D. K. and Choi, K.-S., "Enhancing long-term photostability of BiVO4 photoanodes for solar water splitting by tuning electrolyte composition," Nat. Energy 3, 53-60 (2018).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Costentin, C. and Nocera, D. G., "Self-healing catalysis in water," Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 114, 13380 (2017).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goto, Y. et al. , "A Particulate Photocatalyst Water-Splitting Panel for Large-Scale Solar Hydrogen Generation," Joule 2, 509-520 (2018).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moustakas, T. D. and Paiella, R., "Optoelectronic device physics and technology of nitride semiconductors from the UV to the terahertz," Rep. Prog. Phys. 80, 106501 (2017).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tembhurne, S., Nandjou, F., and Haussener, S., "A thermally synergistic photo-electrochemical hydrogen generator operating under concentrated solar irradiation," Nat. Energy 4, 399-407 (2019).CrossRefGoogle Scholar