FOR many years, the hunt has been on to find ways of releasing hydrogen cheaply and in large quantities through electrolysis so that the gas can be used as a fuel. The latest to claim it is at the threshold of a clean, renewable method of production is a team of US scientists at Pennsylvania State University.
The group, led by professor of electrical engineering Craig Grimes, claims to be “only a couple of problems away” from developing an inexpensive and easily scalable technique for water photoelectrolysis – the splitting of water into hydrogen and oxygen using light energy – that could help power the proposed hydrogen economy.