Liquid hydrogen storage developed at University of Oregon

Chemists from the University of Oregon have developed a safe and stable liquid storage material for hydrogen.

The scientists, led by Shih-Yuan Liu, a professor of chemistry and a researcher with the university's Materials Sciences Institute, believe that this liquid can be readily adopted for use in portable fuel cell devices, but its ultimate applications would be to facilitate easy transition from a gasoline to a hydrogen infrastructure.

Since the current fuel infrastructure is made for liquid material - crude oil and petroleum - the researchers believe that a liquid hydrogen storage material could thus be used and distributed with little modifications to existing systems.

The University of Oregon storage material is a boron-nitrogen-based liquid they call BN-methylcyclopentane. It works safely at room temperature and is air and moisture stable. It uses iron chloride as a catalyst for desorption or hydrogen release and can reabsorb hydrogen easily to allow for recycling of spent fuel.

The researchers' next focus is to improve the hydrogen yield of the material and develop a more energy efficient regeneration mechanism.

The research was funded by the United States Department of Energy, which has set a goal to develop a viable liquid or solid carrier for hydrogen fuel by 2017.

Source: Katrice R. Jalbuena, EcoSeed