Redox Switchable Hydrogen Storage Materials. Hydrogen Burst Device Prototypes

污染、气候变化、主要石化生产国日益加剧的政治不稳定，以及移动应用对电力存储密度的需求，这些因素结合在一起，使得寻找新的可持续能源载体成为21世纪主要的学术和技术挑战之一。由于其清洁燃烧、高热值和产生水作为副产品的环保过程，氢可能是完美的燃料。氢储存吸引了大量的政治支持。然而，在实现所谓的氢经济方面仍然存在关键挑战。以适当的规模、可持续和高效的方式生产和分配氢气是一个重要的挑战。然而，需要克服的最大技术问题是生产和使用之间氢气的有效储存方法。我们的研究已经确定了一种用于储氢的基本材料，克服了当前技术的一些限制。其优点是：在室温下工作，释放/储存由电荷控制，不需要真空或超压来工作，在电触发之前安全地保持氢气，非常快的释放（<1秒）和快速（<1分钟）充电，能够廉价地生产存储系统。然而，氢气储存容量低于车辆的批量储存所需的容量。虽然我们希望显著改善这一点，但我们并不期望达到金属氢化物所达到的水平。因此，我们认为当前储氢计划的相关或协同领域具有商业潜力。在这个项目的过程中，我们希望探索一些应用，在这些应用中，该技术的独特特性为两个主要的商业应用领域提供了显著的好处。首先，快速释放/充电特性表明，该系统可以作为高需求时期的氢气缓冲装置。其次，我们认为存储系统可以作为硅芯片或其他大批量薄膜制造工艺的一部分生产，从而允许移动电话，远程传感器等的氢气微存储。也可能有其他非燃料基础的应用，其中需要少量的氢，或者需要从一个过程中提取氢等。在这个研究项目结束时，我们打算有一个工作原型演示设备，以展示我们的新技术的潜在优势。与此同时，商业发展计划将允许探索潜在市场，并为长期投资提供资金合作伙伴。

The combination of pollution, climate change, increasing political instability in key petrochemical production nations and the need for increased power storage densities for mobile applications has made the search for new and sustainable energy vectors as being one of the key academic and technological challenges in the 21st centaury. Hydrogen potentially could be the perfect fuel due to its clean combustion, high heating value and the environmentally benign process that produces water as the by-product. Hydrogen storage attracts significant political support. Key challenges remain, however, in the delivery of the so called- hydrogen economy . The production and distribution of H2 on an appropriate scale, sustainable and energy efficient manner are important challenges. However, the greatest technical problem to overcome is the effective means of storage of hydrogen between production and use. Our research has identified a fundamental material for hydrogen storage that overcomes some of the limitations of the current technologies. The benefits are: works at room temperature, release/storage controlled by electrical charge, does not need a vacuum or overpressure to work, holds hydrogen safely until triggered electrically, very fast release (<1sec) and fast (<1minute) recharge, the ability to produce the storage system cheaply. However the hydrogen storage capacity is lower than required for bulk storage for vehicles. While we hope to improve this significantly we do not expect to reach the levels obtained by metal hydrides. We therefore see the commercial potential lying in related or synergistic areas to the current hydrogen storage schemes.During the course of this project we wish to explore applications where the unique features of the technology offer significant benefits to two main commercial applications areas. Firstly the fast release/recharge characteristic suggests that this system may be useful as a hydrogen buffer for periods of high demand. Secondly we believe that a storage system could be produced as part of a silicon chip or other high volume thin film manufacturing process, thus allowing micro-storage of hydrogen for mobile phones, remote sensors etc. There may also be other non fuel based applications where hydrogen is needed in small qualities, or hydrogen needs to be extracted from a process etc.At the end of this research project we intend to have a working prototype demonstrator device that will demonstrate the potential advantages of our new technolgy. Along side this a commerial development plan will allow potential markets to be explored and funding partners for longer term investment engaged.