The Evaluation of the Possibility of Using Aluminum to Produce Hydrogen Fuel

One of the promising fuels in terms of economics and ecology is hydrogen. Burning hydrogen does not produce greenhouse gases, and the water formed during the process can be repeatedly decomposed into hydrogen and oxygen, without causing any pollution to the environment. However, using hydrogen as an energy carrier has a number of drawbacks: technical and economic difficulties in storage, transportation and distribution of hydrogen, explosion risk of the hydrogen-air mixture. In this connection, it is proposed to use energy-storage substances, in particular, aluminum as an intermediate energy carrier for hydrogen production. Using the concept of power generation based on the oxidation of aluminum by water, it is proposed to obtain thermal energy from hydrogen fuel. The kinetics of hydrogen production in the chemical decomposition of water is studied in this paper. A series of experiments is performed to determine dependencies of the rate of hydrogen evolution and the volume of the hydrogen liberated from the aluminum surface, on the reaction time.

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