Fill It Up With . . . Hydrogen

02.03.1996

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The cars of the future may run on hydrogen, the lightest and most prevalent element in the universe. Tests carried out with experimental automobiles have already shown hydrogen to be a highly efficient and pollution-free fuel. Its production, however, is prohibitively expensive.

New technology for extracting hydrogen from water with the use of solar energy is being developed at the Weizmann Institute.

Water, whose molecules consist of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom, is the most readily available source of hydrogen. It is possible to break water molecules apart by heating them to very high temperatures under low pressure, but once the hydrogen and oxygen atoms cool down, they quickly recombine.

Prof. Avraham Kogan of the Institute's Solar Research Facilities Unit has developed a new method to keep these atoms separate. It employs a special ceramic membrane--designed in collaboration with the Israel Ceramic & Silicate Institute--that allows mainly hydrogen atoms to pass through while leaving the oxygen on the other side. Heating for the new system is provided by solar energy.

The membrane can withstand tempera-tures of over 2,000 C. "While operation at these temperatures shows that the method is feasible," Prof. Kogan says, "we must get it to work at even higher temperatures for it to become economically viable."

A patent on the device has been registered in the United States, Europe, Australia and Israel by the Yeda Research and Development Company, which is responsible for the commercialization of Weizmann Institute research.

 

Additional Information

Prof. Kogan came to the Weizmann Institute in 1989 at the invitation of Prof. Israel Dostrovsky, who initiated the solar hydrogen production project. The project is presently funded by the Heineman Foundation for Research, Educational, Charitable and Scientific Purposes, Inc., of the USA.

 

The Weizmann Institute of Science is a major center of scientific research and graduate study located in Rehovot, Israel.

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