CN103820807A - Device and method for producing hydrogen and generating electricity - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention discloses a hydrogen generating device and a method thereof. Wherein, the device includes: an electrochemical cell and an ion-exchange membrane arranged in the electrochemical cell to divide the electrochemical cell into an anode chamber and a cathode chamber. An anode and a cathode are respectively arranged in the cathode chamber and the anode chamber, and the anode and the cathode pass through a wire It is connected with a resistor; it is characterized in that: the anode is composed of a catalyst and an anode substrate that can efficiently electrooxidize the corresponding substrate, and the cathode is made of a material with a low hydrogen evolution overpotential; the anode chamber contains the above substrate and neutral or alkaline The electrolyte solution in the cathode chamber is filled with a neutral or acidic electrolyte solution, and the substrate can be catalyzed and oxidized by the catalyst and further generate hydrogen gas under the action of the cathode chamber. The invention can generate hydrogen without adding direct current, and can realize power generation. In addition, it can also be used as a hydrogen storage technology and has broad application prospects.

Description

A device and method for generating hydrogen to generate electricity

technical field

The invention belongs to the fields of applied chemistry and new energy, and in particular relates to a device and method capable of simultaneously generating electricity and hydrogen.

Background technique

Hydrogen is a pollution-free and renewable energy with high energy density, storage and transportation. With the energy crisis and the increasing demand for clean energy, hydrogen, as a clean energy substance with high calorific value, has attracted people's attention. At present, hydrogen generation technologies mainly include coal gasification, petroleum cracking, biomass conversion, electrolysis of water, solar photolysis of water, microbial fermentation, etc. However, these traditional technologies often produce more pollutants or have higher energy consumption. , conversion efficiency is not high and so on. At the same time, due to the high storage and transportation costs of hydrogen, it also affects its wide application. Therefore, it is of great significance to develop environmentally friendly hydrogen generation technologies from hydrogen-containing substances.

Methanol, ethanol, glucose, urea, etc., as typical hydrogen-containing substances, widely exist in nature and are easy to store and transport, especially urea, which exists in large quantities in animal urine. At the same time, the above-mentioned substances can be used as anode fuels in fuel cell technology to realize electrocatalytic oxidation power generation. The electrochemical hydrogen production technology developed using such substances as substrates not only has good energy efficiency, but also has good environmental benefits. However, the current electrochemical techniques for obtaining hydrogen from such substrates often require additional application of direct current, which limits their application in some occasions. For this reason the purpose of the present invention is to develop a kind of technology that can realize producing hydrogen from substrates such as methanol, ethanol, glucose, urea without additionally applying direct current, and this technology can produce electric energy simultaneously.

Contents of the invention

The object of the present invention is to provide an electrochemical device capable of spontaneously converting corresponding substrates into hydrogen and electrical energy. The device can generate hydrogen without applying direct current, and can realize the function of generating electricity at the same time. The hydrogen generating power generation device of the invention is simple, environment-friendly, energy-saving and has high conversion efficiency.

In order to achieve the above object, the technical solution adopted by the present invention is: a device for producing hydrogen to generate electricity, characterized in that the device includes: an electrochemical cell and an electrochemical cell arranged in the electrochemical cell to divide the electrochemical cell into an anode chamber and a cathode chamber The ion exchange membrane is provided with an anode and a cathode in the cathode chamber and the anode chamber respectively, and the anode and the cathode are connected to a resistor through a wire; it is characterized in that: the anode is composed of a catalyst and an anode substrate that can efficiently electrooxidize the corresponding substrate, and the cathode is made of A material with a lower hydrogen evolution overpotential; the anode chamber contains the above substrate and a neutral or alkaline electrolyte solution, and the cathode chamber contains a neutral or acidic electrolyte solution, and the substrate can be catalyzed by the above catalyst Oxidation and further generation of hydrogen under the action of the cathode chamber.

Preferably, the anode substrate is carbon cloth, graphite, carbon felt, titanium sheet, titanium mesh or nickel mesh; the catalyst is platinum carbon, platinum ruthenium carbon, platinum-tungsten oxide or nickel-tin alloy; The material is platinum or nickel alloy.

Preferably: the substrate is methanol, ethanol, glucose or urea.

Preferably: the electrolyte solution in the anode chamber is sodium sulfate, potassium sulfate, sodium chloride, potassium chloride, sodium hydroxide or potassium hydroxide; the electrolyte solution in the cathode chamber is an aqueous sulfate solution, an aqueous phosphate solution, sulfuric acid aqueous solution or hydrochloric acid aqueous solution.

Preferably: the ion exchange membrane adopts a bipolar membrane.

Preferably: the electrochemical cell is made of acid and alkali resistant materials.

Preferably: the acid and alkali corrosion resistant material is polytetrafluoroethylene, plexiglass or inorganic glass.

Preferably: the catalyst is coated on the anode substrate.

Preferably: a voltmeter is connected in parallel at both ends of the resistor for measuring the voltage at both ends of the resistor.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a method for generating hydrogen by using the above-mentioned device, the method comprising the following steps: coating the catalyst on the anode substrate; separating the cathode chamber and the anode chamber with an ion exchange membrane; adding A substrate and a neutral or alkaline electrolyte solution, the substrate can be electrocatalytically oxidized by the above-mentioned catalyst coated on the anode substrate; a neutral or acid electrolyte solution is added in the cathode chamber; passing between the anode and the cathode A resistor is connected externally to the wire, and a voltmeter is connected in parallel at both ends of the resistor to measure the voltage at both ends of the resistor; the catalyst coated on the anode substrate catalyzes the oxidation of the substrate in the anode chamber, releasing electrons and protons, and the electrons are transferred to the cathode through the external circuit , to generate electrical energy; while protons are transferred to the cathode through the electrolyte, where protons and electrons combine to produce hydrogen.

The advantage of the present invention is that hydrogen can be generated without external direct current, and the substrates used are methanol, ethanol, glucose, urea, etc. widely present in nature, saving energy; no pollutants will be produced during the reaction, which is more environmentally friendly; at the same time It can generate electric energy and realize external power supply.

Description of drawings

Fig. 1 is a device schematic diagram of the present invention;

Figure 2 is a schematic diagram of the change in the volume of hydrogen gas collected in the cathode chamber over time

Detailed ways

The present invention will be described in further detail below in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

Referring to Fig. 1, the hydrogen production power generation device of the present invention comprises an electrochemical cell and is arranged in the electrochemical cell and divides the electrochemical cell into an anode chamber and a bipolar membrane of a cathode chamber, and an anode and a cathode are respectively arranged in the cathode chamber and the anode chamber , the anode and the cathode are connected to the resistor through a wire, and a voltmeter is connected in parallel at both ends of the resistor to measure the voltage at both ends of the resistor. The anode is composed of a catalyst material and an anode substrate that can efficiently electrooxidize the corresponding substrate. The substrate can be used as an anode fuel in the fuel cell technology to realize electrocatalytic oxidation power generation, such as methanol, ethanol, glucose, urea, etc. The above substrates It is placed in the anode chamber; the anode substrate is carbon cloth, graphite, carbon felt, titanium sheet, titanium mesh or nickel mesh, and the catalyst material is platinum carbon, platinum ruthenium carbon, platinum-tungsten oxide or nickel-tin alloy; the above catalyst materials are coated with on the anode base. The cathode adopts a material with a low hydrogen evolution overpotential, such as platinum or nickel alloy; both the anode chamber and the cathode chamber contain an electrolyte solution, and the electrolyte in the anode chamber can be neutral sodium sulfate, potassium sulfate, sodium chloride, chlorine Potassium chloride, etc., or alkaline sodium hydroxide, potassium hydroxide, etc.; the electrolyte solution in the cathode chamber can be composed of neutral electrolytes such as sulfate or phosphate aqueous solution, or acid electrolytes such as sulfuric acid and hydrochloric acid. The cathode and anode compartments are separated by a bipolar membrane. The bipolar membrane can be an anodic bipolar membrane, a cathodic bipolar membrane, or a bipolar membrane. The electrochemical cell can be made of materials such as polytetrafluoroethylene, plexiglass, and inorganic glass that are resistant to acid and alkali and corrosion.

The hydrogen generation power generation process of the present invention is: the catalyst coated on the anode substrate catalyzes the oxidation of the substrate in the anode chamber, releasing electrons and protons, and the electrons are transferred to the cathode through an external circuit composed of wires and resistors to generate electric energy; Then it is delivered to the cathode through the electrolyte, where protons and electrons combine to produce hydrogen.

Embodiment: Construct an electrochemical cell with the schematic diagram shown in Fig. 1, the anode substrate is made of rectangular commercial carbon cloth, the area is 6cm ² , the carbon cloth surface is coated with 60% Pt-Ru/C catalyst, and the loading capacity of Pt is 1mg cm ^-2 ; the cathode adopts a rectangular platinum sheet with an area of 3.4cm ² , and the anode chamber contains 16mL of a mixed solution of 2.5mol/L methanol, 0.26mol L ^-1 sodium sulfate and 0.5mol L ^-1 sodium hydroxide; the cathode chamber Containing 0.1mol L ^-1 of sulfuric acid, the cathode chamber and the anode chamber are separated by a bipolar membrane. This electrochemical cell can supply power to the outside. When an external resistance of 50 ohms is connected, the voltage across the resistance is 0.172V, and the power density of the output electric energy calculated according to the area of the anode reaches 0.693W m ^-2 . The volume of hydrogen collected by the cathode gradually increases with the reaction time, as shown in Figure 2, the maximum hydrogen production rate of the cathode can reach 0.65m ³ m ^-3 d ^-1 .

In summary, the present invention can overcome the deficiencies of the prior art, and provide a simple, environmentally friendly, energy-saving and high conversion efficiency device and method for hydrogen production and power generation, which can generate hydrogen without external direct current. The occasion is not limited, so the application field is wide, and the problem of the limited application field of the hydrogen production method in the prior art can be solved.

The above are only preferred embodiments of the present invention, so the scope of implementation of the present invention cannot be limited, that is, equivalent changes and modifications made according to the patent scope of the present invention and the content of the description should all be within the scope of the present invention. Inside.

Claims (10)

1. A device for producing hydrogen to generate electricity, characterized in that the device comprises: an electrochemical cell and an ion-exchange membrane arranged in the electrochemical cell to divide the electrochemical cell into an anode chamber and a cathode chamber, and in the cathode chamber and the anode chamber An anode and a cathode are respectively provided, and the anode and the cathode are connected to a resistor through a wire; it is characterized in that: the anode is composed of a catalyst and an anode substrate that can efficiently electrooxidize the corresponding substrate, and the cathode is made of a material with a low hydrogen evolution overpotential; the anode chamber The above-mentioned substrate and a neutral or alkaline electrolyte solution are contained in the medium, and a neutral or acidic electrolyte solution is contained in the cathode chamber, and the substrate can be catalyzed and oxidized by the above-mentioned catalyst and further generate hydrogen gas under the action of the cathode chamber . 2. The hydrogen generating device according to claim 1, characterized in that: preferably, the anode substrate is carbon cloth, graphite, carbon felt, titanium sheet, titanium mesh or nickel mesh; the catalyst is platinum carbon , platinum ruthenium carbon, platinum·tungsten oxide or nickel·tin alloy; the material of the cathode is platinum or nickel alloy. 3. The device for hydrogen production and power generation according to claim 1, characterized in that: the substrate is methanol, ethanol, glucose or urea. 4. The device for generating hydrogen according to claim 1, characterized in that: the electrolyte solution in the anode chamber is sodium sulfate, potassium sulfate, sodium chloride, potassium chloride, sodium hydroxide or potassium hydroxide; The electrolyte solution in the cathode chamber is an aqueous sulfate solution, an aqueous phosphate solution, an aqueous sulfuric acid solution or an aqueous hydrochloric acid solution. 5. The device for hydrogen production and power generation according to claim 1, characterized in that: the ion exchange membrane is a bipolar membrane. 6. The device for hydrogen production and power generation according to claim 1, characterized in that: the electrochemical cell is made of acid and alkali resistant materials. 7. The device for hydrogen production and power generation according to claim 6, characterized in that: the material resistant to acid, alkali and corrosion is polytetrafluoroethylene, plexiglass or inorganic glass. 8. The hydrogen generating device according to claim 2, characterized in that: the catalyst is coated on the anode substrate. 9. The device for hydrogen production and power generation according to claim 1, characterized in that: a voltmeter is connected in parallel at both ends of the resistor for measuring the voltage at both ends of the resistor. 10. A method of utilizing the device for hydrogen generation and power generation according to claim 1 to carry out hydrogen generation and power generation, comprising the following steps: coating the catalyst on the anode substrate; separating the cathode chamber and the anode chamber with an ion exchange membrane Add substrate and neutral or alkaline electrolyte solution in the anode chamber, the substrate can be electrocatalytically oxidized by the above-mentioned catalyst coated on the anode substrate; add neutral or acid electrolyte solution in the cathode chamber; An external resistor is connected to the cathode through a wire, and a voltmeter is connected in parallel at both ends of the resistor to measure the voltage at both ends of the resistor; the catalyst coated on the anode substrate catalyzes the oxidation of the substrate in the anode chamber, releasing electrons and protons, and the electrons pass through The external circuit is transferred to the cathode to generate electricity; while the protons are transferred to the cathode through the electrolyte, where the protons and electrons combine to generate hydrogen gas.

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