Dec
14
A New Idea to Store Solar Energy
December 14, 2016 | Leave a Comment
A promising, recently identified photocatalytic new material is inexpensive graphitic carbon nitride. The hunt is on for the storage of photogenerated electric energy and its release on demand are still among the main obstacles in artificial photosynthesis.
Scientists are now exploring a modified form of graphitic carbon nitride that can produce light-generated electrons and store them for catalytic hydrogen production even after the light has been switched off.
Image Credit: Wiley. Click image for the largest view.
Nature has split photosynthesis into a light reaction generating electrons and holes from solar energy; and a dark reaction generating the actual “fuels” or chemicals that transport and store this energy. This second, time-lagged process is independent of the primary energy source, the sunlight, and thus ensures that fuel is continually produced over the entire diurnal cycle. This is in contrast to current human-made systems, which suffer from an annoying disruption of energy production during the night.
In photovoltaic systems, solar cells generate electrons for either local use or to feed them into the public grid. Storage of electric energy is usually performed in batteries or by electrochemical conversion into fuels such as hydrogen or methane.
Mimicking Nature’s photosynthesis in a process known as “artificial photosynthesis” would imply using a material that is able to store the electrons right after their light-induced generation and release them on demand. Such a material, graphitic carbon nitride, was explored by Bettina V. Lotsch at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research, Germany, and collaborators in Zurich and Cambridge. The material was obtained from “melon,” an ordered carbon nitride polymer, which is currently heavily investigated for its photocatalytic and semiconducting properties.
The as-modified graphitic nitride is a yellow solid, which changes color upon exposure to light. “This polymer turns blue when photo-irradiated in the presence of certain electron donors in an oxygen-free environment,” said the scientists. This “blue radical” state contains trapped electrons.
The scientists discovered that when the light was switched off and a hydrogen-evolution co-catalyst was added, the polymer turned yellow again while producing hydrogen by releasing the stored electrons. Thus it is possible to decouple the generation of photoinduced electrons from their use, for example, in fuel production, within one single, inexpensive material.
This could be a significant advance for the production of storable solar fuels independent of the intermittency of solar irradiation.
This is a very interesting material. While its too soon to imagine how efficient it might be or estimate its usefulness, there is a basis to begin experiments on how it might be put to use.
The very idea that a material could be exposed to sunshine during the day and put the energy to work overnight is a revolution of sorts, one that might just enthrall us in the coming years. Its a whole new field of technology.
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